


Nothing can I hold of you but thought

by Swimmer963



Series: A Song for Two Voices [8]
Category: Valdemar Series - Mercedes Lackey
Genre: Adventure, Ancient History, Angst, Confusion, Cute Kids, Depression, Difficult Decisions, Gen, Loneliness, Matchmaking, Politics, Spies & Secret Agents, Spy lessons, Suicidal Thoughts, Travel, group rationality, rationality
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-18
Updated: 2020-02-28
Packaged: 2020-12-21 13:57:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 23
Words: 174,990
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21076025
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Swimmer963/pseuds/Swimmer963
Summary: After the revelations of the past winter, the Heraldic Circle is wobbling its way to a new normal. The immediate chaos may be past, but an immortal mage lurks beyond their border, and however confusing and terrifying that reality is, they need a plan. To understand Leareth’s motives, they need something more objective than words from the man’s own lips; ideally, an outside perspective on his history.Herald-Mage Vanyel is trying to find his own way forward. With Yfandes fully on his side for the first time in years, maybe he can reason his way through to a world that makes sense again.Meanwhile, Dara, the young soon-to-be King’s Own, Gifted with Foresight, dreams of a distant plain where, just maybe, they could find the answers they need.





	1. Chapter One

_Two Companions stand under a full moon, alone in a grove. Their bodies are shaped like horses, whiter than snow, and the stallion stands two hands taller than the mare, majestic, mane rippling in the invisible breeze. _

_They are shaped like horses – and in the blue, there is a woman, dark hair streaked with grey, weathered brown skin, strong capable hands. She stands with her hands clasped behind her back, calm, ready – and in front of her, is a pillar of light barely in the shape of a man. _

_Yfandes, says the silvery shape, the core of the Monarch’s Own Companion – Groveborn, immortal, never human. _

_Rolan. _

_I trust that we understand each other now. _

_We do. In the blue, the being that is Yfandes straightens her spine, lifts her chin. _

_I will not claim to know what Taver was thinking, Rolan says. When he ordered you to keep this secret. Perhaps he saw something…yet, in any case, I do not think his orders extended so far as to keep it from me as well. _

_Yfandes prances in place, uncomfortable. I’m sorry. Rolan, maybe I should have told you, but you were a stranger to me, and I wasn’t brave enough. And when I Looked… I don’t know. It was unclear. _

_Nonetheless, the Groveborn says. It was a mistake. _

_Yfandes bows her head. Maybe. I’m trying to do the right thing, Rolan. So are you. All we can do is fight for Valdemar, as long as we have bodies and minds to fight with. Together. At least, I would prefer it that way. _

_Practiced words, that fall like stones between them. _

_The being that is Rolan looks at her, steadily, with eyes of pure light – and sees everything that she is, a sprawling pattern of silver against the bottomless blue. Decisions, dreams, tangled threads…_

_A pattern that does not and will not walk away, never ever ever. _

_You have changed, Rolan says. _

_In the moonlit grove, a white mare bows her head. In the blue, the woman that is Yfandes dabs tears from her eyes. I know. I had to. I couldn’t abandon him to this, Rolan. _

_And yet you left. _

_I came back. _

_It is an old conversation now, a familiar dance, but one with no comfortable ending. _

_You know that there must be consequences, the being that is Rolan says. You have broken the rules, Yfandes. _

_I know. She lifts her head, blue eyes that are not quite a horse’s eyes meeting his. I accept the consequences. As long as I am with my Chosen. That is all I ask. _

_I would not keep you apart, Yfandes. He needs you. More than ever, now. _

_A pause. _

_Yfandes, the being of light says. You realize, you are no longer an ordinary Companion. _

_I know. It wasn’t on purpose!_

_In the trees, a stallion neighs. In the blue, a sound that is something like laughter. I believe you, that it was not on purpose. You have torn out a pillar of your mind. It must have hurt. _

_It hurt so much. _

_The herd will know something is different, Rolan says. Perhaps not what. Perhaps we need not enlighten them. _

_A startled gasp. The mare paws at the grass. You wish me to keep it secret? _

_It is your choice. I imagine you might prefer not to speak of it. _

_Silence. _

_I am not sure that I trust you, the being that is Rolan says. Ringing steel, and no human emotion. _

_I’m sorry. _

_She is not sure that she trusts him, either, but she does not put that into words. He sees it anyway, in the pattern that is her, she is naked in the glare of his mind. _

_The stallion rears, and the mare cringes back into the trees. _

_Sorry is not the point. We need you, Yfandes. Valdemar needs you. And so you must have a second chance, though it does not entirely please me. _

_Silence. _

_Rolan, the being that is Yfandes says. What will you do? If you decide that I – or my Chosen – can no longer be trusted? _

_The pillar of light shines, unyielding. I will do what I must. Let us hope to avoid that eventuality. _


	2. Chapter Two

Medren glanced up as the door opened. “Oh. Heya, Stef.”

His roommate didn’t answer, just slammed the door, crossed to his bed, and flung himself down on top of the covers. Boots and all.

Medren felt his eyebrows rising into his hair. “I was about to leave for lunch.” He had been waiting for Stef for a quarter-candlemark, actually. They were in different morning classes now; in the fourth year of their studies, the Bardic students had more options about areas to specialize. Stef was frustrated because he wanted to take everything, and had finally settled on Advanced History instead of Court Etiquette, while Medren chose the opposite.

Stef didn’t respond.

“Are you coming?” Medren added.

Stef, face pressed into the pillow, made a muffled sound that was probably a ‘no’.

“Really?” It wasn’t like Stef to skip meals.

Stef flopped over onto his back. “M’too tired. Need a nap.” He yawned, then draped an arm over his eyes – which, in fact, bore dark circles all around. “Wake me in a candlemark? Randale’s got an audience…”

“You’re missing class again?” Medren pushed back his chair and stood. “I can hand in your essay if you want.”

“…There’s an essay?”

“Don’t tell me you forgot again.” It wasn’t like Stef to forget about homework, either – at least, it hadn’t been until two months ago.

“I must’ve,” Stef mumbled sheepishly. “Damn.”

“Breda’s going to skin you.”

Stef uncovered his eyes long enough to shoot Medren a plaintive look. “You could be more sympathetic.”

Medren rolled his eyes. “Stef, you don’t deserve sympathy. You entirely got yourself into this situation.”

“Hey. That’s not fair.”

“Go tell Breda that, then,” Medren said, a little more kindly. “She’s just waiting for you to tell her you can’t keep up with your class load _and _serve the King _and _have secret spy-lessons at the crack of dawn.”

“No,” Stef muttered. “S’a test…”

Maybe it was a test of sorts. If so, Medren suspected Stef was currently failing it abysmally. _He won’t admit that he can’t do everything. _Stef saw this as his one chance to impress the King and his close advisors, and he had always hated to admit weakness. He had coasted through years of lessons on sheer talent; nothing had been hard for him before.

Breda knew that, and clearly had no intention of intervening until Stef got over his pride and requested it.

Medren remembered very clearly the night that he had waited up in his room, rehearsing the words to confront his roommate. And then Stef had finally wandered in, tired and shaky and radiating some combination of smugness and confusion, and shattered all of his planned words. _Stef, damn it, you’re the only person who could spin getting caught eavesdropping into spy training. _That wasn’t even the most surreal part. Stef, without too much prodding, had admitted his Wild Gift – the one Medren had distantly suspected for years, now, after one too many times that Stef had come in, started humming surreptitiously, and Medren’s headache or backache or sore feet mysteriously disappeared.

Medren had figured it was Stef’s business if he wanted to keep it a secret. He could guess the justification Stef was making to himself, that he wanted to save revealing it for a good moment, when he could spin it into the best reward – and the true reason that likely lurked under it, that Stef couldn’t predict how Breda or the others would react, and still feared and hated what he didn’t understand. And it was his life, and his choice to make.

In any case, it _had_ worked out, and Stef had in fact spun it into a reward of sorts – thus the smugness – or a punishment, depending on how one looked at it. It had to be deliberate on someone’s part, that the King had crammed two more heavy commitments into Stef’s schedule without cutting him any slack on schoolwork. Stef hadn’t had any free time in a month, and he usually came back from Court an exhausted puddle. Medren was starting to be concerned – he had expected Stef to put his foot down and start saying no to things weeks ago.

_Oh, Stef. You think you’re out for yourself, but you care. _Medren doubted his friend would ever _admit _that the reason he willingly wore himself out using his Gift all afternoon was as simple as hating to see another human being in pain. He would say it was for his own advancement, that impressing the King was good for his career prospects, and sure, that was part of it. But not all.

Maybe Medren ought to go to Breda privately, ask her to go easy on Stef in lessons… No, that wouldn’t work, he could predict exactly the look she would give him.

At least Stef had Jisa. She seemed sensible, and if she told Stef he needed to get more rest, he might listen.

* * *

Spring.

It was one of the first really nice days, the sky a depthless bowl of blue, the air fresh and clean and smelling of early flowers. Shavri had spent half a candlemark on a walk with Jisa, before her daughter’s lessons. She wished she could have spent the whole day outside.

Unfortunately, she was in the throne room, which didn’t even have windows; it was nested deep in the Palace, stone on all sides, well-shielded. Dim and dreary, despite the numerous candles.

Two and a half months. It felt like more things should have changed. She shouldn’t still be spending her afternoons in audiences, listening to Guild representatives gripe and moan about trade-policy – but she had to, because regardless of what might be happening right now in the north, there was still a Kingdom to run.

They had fallen back into a routine. A new normal, impossible as it seemed. One where Vanyel still didn’t attend meetings with the Senior Circle, though he had resumed sitting in Council meetings – Randi had noted it would be suspicious if he stopped for long, and to her surprise, Tran had agreed. _They’ve gotten used to Van intimidating the more irritating lords into line. _

Vanyel was back to dealing with Web-alarms, as well, and taking on the majority of the routine mage-work. Shavri still worried about him, but he finally seemed like his normal self again. Mostly. In public he was as remote as ever, but in private, he was more open with her. The unspoken pit of horrors lay between them, never quite brought into the light, but he was more honest about how he was feeling than ever before. That was something.

_We’re all finding ways to bear it._ Slowly, painfully absorbing the news, learning to live in a world where an immortal mage was even now preparing his invasion-force, for horrifying ends – worse, a world Vanyel’s judgement wasn’t entirely to be trusted.

Shavri rested her hand on Randi’s shoulder, feeding through a steady stream of her own energy. She had finally given in and asked some of the Palace workmen to add padding to his throne; she hadn’t had any idea how uncomfortable the damned thing was until, after a night of listening to Randi’s complaints, she had discreetly tried it out herself. _Why didn’t anyone ever say anything? _Poor Queen Elspeth had taken audiences sitting in the thing well into her seventies.

Trainee Stefen was in the corner, mostly hidden behind a reed screen, playing very quietly. Working his strange Wild Gift, totally unrelated to Healing, and Moondance hadn’t been able to make heads or tails of it either in the brief time before he and Starwind returned to k’Treva. Even Jisa hadn’t been able to replicate it when Shavri had pulled her daughter in for shared Concert-seeing.

She hadn’t given up, though, and either way it was more than enough. As long as Stef could be there, Randi wasn’t hurting. She could be grateful for that much.

The representative from the fishermen’s guild had stopped speaking. Shavri felt Tantras’ gentle double-tap against her shields, and let him through.

_:I’ll have Dara write up their proposal for the next Council meeting: _he sent._ :Any thoughts?:_

_:I wasn’t really listening: _she confessed.

_:That’s all right: _A wry mental chuckle, though his face showed no hint of humour. _:It wasn’t important. The next one is, though. Lord Remoerdis of Lineas-Baires is here with his entourage: _

_:Tashir?: _Had she known he was arriving today? Probably. At one point she had asked Dara to make sure he was assigned guest-quarters, so she must have known he was coming for the spring festival, but then it had been lost under a tide of other details.

_:Yes, Tashir: _There was a tense undercurrent in Tran’s mindvoice, that she couldn’t interpret. _:This is his first formal visit to Haven since the annexation. And I believe he brought a number of his mages. The Baires mages, rather: _Confusion in his mindvoice, and a hint of worry.

Right. _:They’ve been having trouble with the vrondi: _Shavri sent. _:He’s hoping we can find a way to put them in the Web, even though none of them are Chosen. He had Randi and Savil’s permission to bring them:_ It seemed a risk to her, to invite a number of foreign mages to the capital, even if Baires was technically Valdemaran soil. Maybe it was worth it, though. In the scenario where Valdemar ended up at war with Leareth in the next couple of years–

She didn’t want to think about it, which was a flag that she really needed to think about it, except that now really wasn’t the time, she was supposed to be paying attention.

Footsteps, slow and measured. Shavri lifted her head, pasting a smile on her lips.

“King Randale.” The young man, curly golden-brown hair pulled into a knot, bowed, then knelt at Randi’s feet. He had done some growing up, Shavri thought wonderingly – at twenty, he still didn’t look old enough to be lord of the biggest single landholding in Valdemar, but he was taller than she remembered, and filled out his Whites. He moved with steady confidence.

“Lord Remoerdis.” Randi’s spoke formally, but with warmth. “Welcome to Haven.” A pause, and then he smiled. “Oh, come on. Stand up. It’s good to have you here, Tashir.” He held out his hand. “I hope the journey wasn’t too tiring?”

“The weather was excellent.” Tashir’s eyes flicked to Savil, standing silently at Randi’s side. “Is there someone I should be thanking for that?”

The older Herald-Mage inclined her head.

“You have my gratitude.” Tashir smiled as well. “Herald-Mage Savil. It’s wonderful to see you again!”

“Likewise.” Savil’s tone was formal, but there was warmth in it, and she stepped forward gripped Tashir’s arm, holding it for a few seconds. “Welcome. We’re glad to have you here.I’ve heard very good things about your leadership.”

“You have? Really?” Tashir ducked his head, blushing, and suddenly he looked even younger. “I’m forgetting my manners!” Tashir bobbed his head, then turned, beckoning to the knot of people behind him. “King Randale, I believe you have already met my weaponsmaster, Jervis. And this is Melenna, my castelaine.”

Melenna. Why was that name so familiar?

_:Melenna is my grand-nephew Medren’s mother: _Savil prompted. _:I like her, she’s quite levelheaded: _Overtones of amusement. _:Well, she is now anyway. Maybe not so much when Medren was born: _

No, it generally wasn’t the sensible girls who got themselves pregnant with bastards. It had worked out all right for Melenna, at least – it didn’t always, which Shavri knew all too well after four years with Need. Gods, sometimes she wished she could personally educate every single girl in the Kingdom about herbs for contraception…

Too soon, it would be time to have that conversation with Jisa. Her daughter was growing up so fast. Still terrifying, but less so than it had been before one late-night conversation months ago.

_Stop woolgathering. _She focused on the elderly, craggy-faced armsmaster as he knelt before Randi’s throne, remembering him vaguely from four years ago. He was about Savil’s age, ten years older than Vanyel’s father; they had served in the Guard together. Jervis’ showed his age more in some ways, deep lines scoring his face, but he was still muscular and moved with the balance of a trained, fit swordsman.

Maybe she ought to invite him to spar. Shavri patted the sword-hilt at her side. _:Need, would you like that?: _

Need seemed to vibrate slightly under her hands, a sort of leashed eagerness.

_:All right. I know you like showing off: _It felt a little like cheating, if Need was going to help, but it wasn’t like she was a trainee anymore. In the real world, you used all the resources you had.

_:Won’t cheat: _Need grunted, and then lapsed into silence again, per usual. Still, the sword had been somewhat chattier in recent months. Shavri had been ‘talking’ to her more often, hoping to prod her into wakefulness.

To her surprise, Jervis, after greeting Savil, turned to her as well, bowing. “Healer Shavri. My pleasure.”

Shavri felt a genuine smile creep across her face. “The pleasure is mine.” Usually people – men in particular – ignored the tired woman in Healer’s robes standing behind and to the side of the throne. Like she was furniture. On some level it was nice, leaving her with plenty of space to observe and pass on her notes to Tran or Randi, but it irked her as well. Even Tashir had been a culprit.

Melenna greeted her as well, formally, but with a sparkle in her enormous hazel eyes. The eyes were the main feature she shared with her son; in other ways, Medren could have been a younger, slimmer copy of Lord Withen Ashkevron.

Shavri tried to return Melenna’s smile, even though something twinged in her chest. Melenna was actually older than her, but she looked so young and pretty. Not like a certain overworked Healer who barely deserved that title anymore, who at just thirty thirty had the first hints of crow’s-feet and found new white hairs every week. It didn’t seem fair.

_Don’t be petty, _she told herself firmly. It was unbecoming.

“Let me make some other introductions,” Tashir said. “First, a note. In Baires, mages traditionally receive the title of Adept, Master, or Journeyman. We currently have no Adepts, unfortunately, but let me introduce Master Aubernon, First in the Little Court of Qorthes…”

* * *

The door to her Work Room opened and shut.

“You’re late, _ke’chara_,” Savil said without looking up.

“Sorry, aunt. Got distracted.” His voice was neutral, impossible to read. “By the way, Shavri Mindtouched me to say she’s coming soon.”

“She is?” Savil straightened up, rubbing her lower back. She was perched on a short stool, knees splayed, her buttocks already aching from the hard surface. “Good.” It was about time – not that Savil was going to be take it at face value until Shavri actually showed up. It was the fourth time the Healer had blocked out an evening to help them, and something had always come up. “Did she tell you Tashir’s here?” she added.

“Yes. I suppose I ought to greet him at some point.” His voice tightened, a shadow crossing his face.

She could guess why. The lad’s resemblance to Tylendel was just as uncanny if not more so, now that he had grown up some, and it had to be worse for Van.

Change the topic. “Van, I had an idea.”

He had been helping with her research again, over the last month; Randi couldn’t see how Leareth could work his agenda through that, if Savil was leading and Leareth wasn’t even talking to Vanyel anymore. She wondered if Van knew they’d had that conversation. It still hurt to think about, every time.

“Say more?” Interest flickered in his eyes, and he joined her, squatting with his forearms resting loosely across his thighs. Oh, for the flexibility of youth…

“Not for the permanent Gate-threshold, sadly,” she admitted, looking down at the miniature stone archway set on a stone disk in front of her. “I’m stuck where I was before – I can lay a threshold and stabilize it, but it doesn’t renew itself once it’s used, and it won’t _stay _stable for more than a few candlemarks.”

“Hmm.” Vanyel closed his eyes, his hand drifting over to touch the tiny Gate-arch. “What’s your idea, then?”

“It’s to do with you, actually.” Savil tried not to smirk at his surprised, discomfited look. “It was mostly Shavri’s idea,” honesty made her add. “And I think she got the prompt from Jisa. That child really is a wonder. We were talking about your, well, problem with Gates. Musing on how it works, and whether it’s curable. I mean, for one, any mage can recognize the feel of Gate-energy, but it’s not really a different kind of energy from the rest. So it’s not clear why it should affect you the way it does.”

He didn’t need to know that she had gone back and forth with Randi on whether to even bring it up. If they were able to cure his sensitivity to Gates, Van would be a lot more powerful, and it had seemed worth discussing whether that was something they wanted. In the end, they had settled on yes, but it made her chest ache to think that it had been a question at all.

“Oh.” For a moment, Vanyel just blinked at her. Then he brought a hand to his forehead, slowly. “I’m such an idiot. Why did I never think of that?”

“None of us did. I mean, when I actually think back… Lancir told me you would have trouble, and I didn’t even ask how he knew that, I just trusted him at his word. And then we had you try in k’Treva, and it _was _bad and neither of us was surprised. So I guess we didn’t ask any further questions.”

Vanyel’s eyes had gone distant. “…Doesn’t that make you wonder how many _other _questions we’ve forgotten to ask ourselves?”

No – at least, not until he had said it out loud.

She shook her head, pushing away that uneasy thought. “Van, it’s not like I can See anything to do with your channels that would predict it. We figured, Lance was a Mindhealer too, and maybe it was that Sight that he used.”

“You think it’s all in my head?” A sharp edge in his voice.

She quickly held up a hand. “No, no, that’s not it – I mean, it’s not any more ‘all in your head’ than being able to walk or see.” Quite a number of things were in one’s head, in that sense. _Just look at poor Starwind. _

Vanyel nodded, relaxing a little. “Anyway,” Savil went on. “Shavri said she would try to bring Jisa, and the three of us could all try hopping in a concert-Sight meld while you work on some tiny Gates. That shouldn’t be too bad for you, right?”

Vanyel made a face. Savil wasn’t sure if it was at the prospect of Gate-work, or of having Jisa use her Mindhealing Sight on him. Neither would be appealing.

“All right,” he said finally. “I can see as well as you can how valuable it would be to Randi if I were better at Gates.”

Savil would have started with the fact that he wouldn’t have to risk pain so often.

There was a knock. Savil started to rise, knees creaking, but Vanyel beat her to it.

“Sorry we’re late,” Shavri said, as Vanyel closed the door behind her.

Jisa tore past her mother. “Heya, Aunt Savil!”

“Heya, pet.” Accepting the hug, Savil ruffled the child’s hair. Scarcely a child anymore. Jisa’s head was level with her mother’s chin, knobby wrists showing past the cuffs of her gown.

This wasn’t the first time Shavri had included Jisa in recent months, bringing her along to make use of her Sight or her other Gifts. Savil approved, overall, but it startled her every time. She still wondered exactly what conversation had happened, after she left Randi and the others in his quarters that night two months ago.

Vanyel carried over two stools and a cushion from the stash she kept in here, having finally given into her pride and admitted that neither standing for an entire working nor kneeling on the stone floor did her body any good.

“You should have these made with padding,” Shavri said, taking a stool. “By the way, did you hear about Katha?”

“…No. What about Katha?”

A smug, almost secretive smile. “She’s pregnant. I found out today, she came to ask me rather than go to Healers’.”

“Oh!” Savil was surprised at the quiver in her chest. “Whose child?” she added after a moment. “I didn’t know she was married.”

“She’s not.” Shavri was smirking. “Though she’s had some dalliances with, what’s-his-name, Herald Tobin. Think she asked him to do the honours. He’s a Mindspeaker and a strong Fetcher, so even chances their child will be Gifted.”

Savil stroked the tip of her nose, thoughtfully. “This is about Randi’s proposal for getting Heralds to have more children, isn’t it?”

“I suppose so. Katha wouldn’t have dared it if she wasn’t expecting to have help.” Shavri lowered herself onto the stool, carefully navigating her robes, and the long sword that hung from one side of her belt. “She wants to be a mother, though. You should have seen her smile, when I told her.” A pause. “Keiran came to me as well. She wanted children as well, you know, but what with being in the Guard, and then being Chosen…”

Savil frowned. “Isn’t she a bit old for it?” Keiran was past forty now.

“Well, yes, but she’s healthy as a horse. I’ve had a look, and it’ll be harder but she should be able to conceive naturally, epecially with a Healer’s help. The risk of miscarriage is higher, and of birth deformities – I promised her I would check regularly, if she goes through with it, and we can end the pregnancy if there is something wrong.”

“Hmm.” It made sense, Savil thought. Keiran hadn’t ever mentioned wanting littles – but why would she have brought it up? It would have been a dream from a past life, set aside behind duty to her Kingdom. No point brooding on might-have-beens.

It did make her wonder. How many of the others would have wanted families, if it had seemed like a possibility?

Donni hadn’t been particularly maternal, but she had adored other people’s children… A twinge in her chest, _don’t think about that – _and the catch in her thoughts, an echo that sounded like Lancir and Melody’s voices speaking together. _Don’t block it out either. _

Would she_, _Savil, have ever considered it? Certainly at fourteen she had been nowhere near ready to think about babies, and then the rest of her life had happened. It was far too late now, of course – at nearly seventy-six years old, she was certainly past childbearing.

Gods, she kept forgetting that in a few more months, she would be the same age Queen Elspeth had been when she died. _I feel like such a relic. _

“Let’s get to work,” she heard herself say. “Shavri, I was thinking we start with Van, and what we were discussing.”

“Of course.” Shavri’s eyes rested on her for a moment, almost speculative.

A moment later, the thread of Savil’s thoughts caught up to what she should really have remembered immediately. There was a war coming. Katha knew that. She still wanted to bring a babe into the world?

Then again, there was always danger on the horizon. They could hardly set their lives aside until all the Kingdom’s problems were solved. Maybe they would lose the war, and it would all be for nothing, but maybe they would win, in which case there needed to be a next generation. _We have to plan for the long run. _For the world in which Valdemar had a future at all, even if it was so far from a sure thing.

On the heels of that thought: Leareth, if he was telling the truth, didn’t want to destroy Valdemar, or kill any more of its people than he needed to. Because he needed them for a different, far worse purpose, decades from now – but even if they lost, Katha’s child might still have a home to grow up in.

If Leareth was telling the truth, maybe even a better one. That was a bizarre and painful thought.

Savil rubbed her forehead. _Stop woolgathering. _Jisa was climbing into Shavri’s lap, and Van had settled himself on a cushion in front of the little Gate, legs crossed.

_:Here: _Shavri sent, reaching out a mental hand. Savil sighed and meshed her shields with the Healer, more deeply than usual. Jisa slipped into the meld a moment later. She felt like Shavri in some ways, but her aura was more gold than green, and somehow sharper-edged, her mind all darting eager curiosity.

Savil reached for mage-sight, the world unfolding into trickles and currents of energy, Vanyel’s swirling mage-aura seeming to fill the room. She leaned even deeper into the link, offering up her Sight like a gift-token.

_:Pretty: _Jisa sent. Or thought to herself, maybe. A moment later, Savil felt Jisa offering something as well. _Steady_, she thought, and accepted that handshake. The bundle of energy that was Vanyel seemed to unfold further, opening like a flower, blossoming into… _Oh. _

Savil had never shared Jisa’s Sight before, and it was different from Melody’s – which was to be expected, everyone experienced Sight differently. That was true of mage-sight as well, and one of the reasons true concert-work was so challenging.

Vanyel’s mind lay sprawled in front of her, half-obscured by shields but still visible. A vibrant garden, always in motion, woven tightly – but at the center of it, an empty space. It had shown up a little differently in Melody’s Sight, but it had been just as painful to look at.

Shavri leaned in closer as well, parting a deeper layer of shields, and Savil felt her jaw go slack as the Healer’s Sight overlapped the rest. _It’s so beautiful. _

For a long moment, she just watched, half-awed, half-overwhelmed.

_:Van: _Shavri sent finally, pulling him into a group-link, but not the deeper meld. _:I think we’re ready: _

_:Uncle Van, can you shield less?: _Jisa added. _:I can’t See properly: _

_:Yes. I have to be open to prepare the Gate: _Distaste in the overtones; again, Savil wasn’t sure if it was about the anticipated pain or about giving up his mental privacy. A moment later, the glow of his mind brightened, the garden sharper and clearer. _:Is that better?:_

_:Yes, thank you: _Jisa sent, reassuring.

_:Remember to go slowly: _Savil sent.

_:All right: _He dropped the Mindspeech-link, but was still wide-open, and she Saw the ripple in his aura as he centered and grounded. With Thoughtsensing, or maybe Jisa’s Empathy, she could sense the trepidation rising in him.

_:Savil: _Shavri sent. _:Focus on his channels?: _

Savil acknowledged her, wordlessly, and let her Sight fall inward. The pool of quiescent energy that was Vanyel’s reserves was full enough. A moment later, she Saw him feed a trickle of it along the broad channel that was his mage-gift, laying down the first thread of the tiny Gate-threshold.

_:Oh!: _Jisa sent. _:Look. He’s going all tense: _

It was hard to filter through all the layers of Sight, hers and not-hers. Even so, Savil could See his channels…clenching? Narrowing, as though there were muscles going tense. _Do I do that? _She had never even thought about it before, but…yes, she decided. Now that she knew to ask that question, she knew that she could and did ‘tighten’ her channels, to control the flow of energy more carefully.

Vanyel’s aura oscillated wildly. If he had been a student of hers, she would have snapped at him. _Smoothly! _But he wasn’t a trainee, and he had raised dozens of Gates, at sizes and distances far greater than this miniature one. He couldn’t actually be out of control.

_:See the stress-reaction in his body?: _Shavri sent. _:It was there before he even started the Gate, but it’s feeding on itself: _

Now that Shavri pointed it out, Savil could See as well – how Vanyel’s heart was already pounding, the currents of life-energy roiling and disturbed.

_:He’s trying too hard to control it: _Jisa sent. _:See?: _

The threshold was shining in her mage-sight now, nearly complete.

_:Um, I forgot to ask: _Vanyel sent after a moment – his mindvoice leaked distress, but was clear enough. _:Where to?: _

Oops. _:The other end is in my quarters. Table in the corner: _

_:Right: _

A pause, and then she saw the first tendrils reaching from the scaled-down Gate, searching in a direction that wasn’t up or down or sideways. Searching the Void-between-the-Gates. They were undirected, confused – Vanyel hadn’t mastered the trick she had, of giving his Gates a bearing, and she thought he might not quite remember where the second threshold was. _I should have taken him over there first. _There wasn’t any real risk, like there would be with a larger Gate, which could easily drain the unfortunate mage in question unconscious or even kill them if they weren’t able to focus clearly enough on a destination. Still, it couldn’t be much fun for poor Van right now. He was a trembling bundle of desperate, sweating exertion.

–The Gate was pulling from him now, sucking power from his reserves through the channel of his mage-gift. Which should have been more than broad enough to allow that flow, but he was trying so hard to hold onto it. The ‘walls’ of all his channels were spasming, like a cramped muscle, blocking the flow, which forced its way through in spurts. Buffeting and scraping the insides raw in the process. That was one of the causes of ordinary backlash, especially when pulling from the turbulence of node-energy, which bruised and irritated even an Adept-class mage’s channels.

Van wasn’t using node-energy. He should have been able to stay in perfect control, feeding the power through at exactly the rate needed – and for a Gate this small, that rate shouldn’t have been anywhere near enough to strain his Gifts. None of which changed what she was seeing.

Savil Saw as the first tiny tendril find its destination, and the rest happened almost too fast to See – the Gate, tearing a final bolt of energy from Van’s reserves through that desperately narrowed channel, snapped up.

Vanyel’s aura darkened and swirled, and Savil almost reached in on reflex – he Looked exactly like a student about to lose control and, a second later, lose consciousness.

He caught himself, and the tiny Gate stabilized.

_:He’s still fighting it: _Jisa sent. _:See? Like it’s on instinct. He’s fighting himself trying to stay in control: _

Savil could see that.

_:Van: _she sent. _:Doing all right? Can you hold it a few minutes?: _

_:I’ll be fine: _But he didn’t seem fine at all. He was leaking pain, and something like suppressed panic. Even the flow of energy needed to replenish the Gate and keep it stable had to rip its way through his constricted channels.

Through Jisa’s shared eyes, Savil could See the resolve in him, and the scaffolding that held it. Because it was the right thing to do, the Kingdom needed his power and he could serve Randi better if he made progress on this, and that was worth it.

Behind that determination, the emptiness lurked, and she Saw how the vines that were him leaned towards it and away at the same time.

_:I think there’s some very minor energy-leakage into the physical plane: _Shavri sent. _:Where his channels ‘connect’ to the part of his mind that controls his mage-gift. It’s not causing a lot of damage, it’s well within the range of what the brain can heal, but it is bruising the tissues a little. If it were more severe, the damage might well be permanent: _A pause. _:Is that something that can happen?:_

Savil tried to think. _:I don’t know: _It was a horrifying prospect._ :There is something I’ve read about. A mage who tries to use more energy than their Gift can manage – typically, if someone below Adept-potential tries to touch a node, and doesn’t pull away when they start to lose control – can burn out their own Gift. I’ve never seen it–:_

_:But when we burn out a Gift on purpose, it isn’t by breaking the channel: _Jisa jumped in. _:We break the pathways in the mind instead: _There was a heaviness and regret in her mindvoice that didn’t seem right, coming from an eleven-year-old.

Well, that was disturbing.

_:And those are in the brain: _Shavri added. _:I’m Seeing the physical structures, Jisa is Seeing the mind-pathways, but we’re Looking at the same thing: _

_:And I’m Seeing his channels: _Savil added. _:Which are so tight, it’s almost like he’s pinching off his own mage-gift, trying to control it. I imagine that’s causing the spillage, or making it worse – it’s got nowhere else to go: _

They watched in silence for another thirty seconds. Savil could see Vanyel trying to calm himself, more through Shavri’s Healing-Sight than her own Sight, how he struggled to control his breathing. The tensed channels were like a muscle-cramp at this point, she thought – once a muscle had gone into spasm, it was difficult or impossible to relax it on purpose.

Vanyel was clearly in agony, which couldn’t have made it easier to loosen up.

_:I think we’ve seen enough: _she sent finally, unable to bear it any longer. _:Shavri? I’m telling him to drop it: _

Vanyel’s relief was obvious. It took him another thirty seconds to unwind the Gate-energies and reabsorb them into his reserves – his channels were just as locked up in the return direction. With anyone else, Savil would have told him off for being so sloppy and made him try again, but it was no wonder he couldn’t concentrate properly.

Finally, it was done.

Savil released the meld and opened her eyes, just in time to see Vanyel slump to the floor.

She levered herself down from the stool, kneeling beside him. “Van?”

“I’m all right.” He rolled over onto his back, but didn’t open his eyes, and his voice was a little slurred. “Sorry. Need a minute. Gods, I hate Gating.”

“I can see why.” She reached to brush a lock of hair back from his sticky forehead, then retrieved his cushion and gently slid it under his head. There, that looked marginally more comfortable. “Take your time,” she added, keeping her voice to a low murmur – Van would be sensitive to sound right now. And light; she thought to dim the mage-light near the ceiling.

Shavri slipped down from her own stool. “Van, I’ll do a bit of Healing now. Actually, Savil, can I borrow your mage-sight again? I can work on his channels a lot more effectively if you help me See what I’m doing.”

Savil nodded, and lowered her inner shields again. _:Here: _

Half a candlemark later, they were in her quarters. She had decided against doing any more of the planned work tonight, given what she had already put Van through.

Vanyel lay on her sofa with his shoulders and feet propped up on extra pillows, holding a damp cloth to his forehead, his other hand loose around a half-drunk cup of willowbark tea. Well sweetened with honey – even after such a small, short-range Gate, he was drained, and needed the sugar.

Shavri and Jisa had pulled chairs over from her little table, and Savil had taken her own overstuffed armchair, after dragging it over so that she could stroke her nephew’s hair. It seemed to soothe him.

“It does make sense, that you would tense up,” Shavri was saying. “Given your past experience with Gates.”

“Mmm.” Vanyel licked his lips.

“It’s normally a protective mechanism,” Savil mused. “This ability to narrow your mage-channels and control the flow of energy, to prevent damage from trying to handle too much. Only, I wonder if you’re overdoing it.”

“I’m not trying to!” Vanyel protested. He started to lift his head, slowly bringing the mug of tea to his lips; his hand trembled, threatening to spill it.

Savil leaned in, supporting the back of his head with her palm, and laying her hand over his to steady it. “_Ke’chara_, are you cold?” she added, concerned.

“Maybe a little,” he admitted.

Savil glanced over. “Can one of you get a blanket from my bedroom?”

Jisa leapt up eagerly. “I’ll go!”

Vanyel grimaced. “You don’t need to fuss over me like this.”

“I like coddling you,” Savil said. “Besides, I’m the one who made you Gate just for research purposes. How’s your head now?”

“Better. I’ll be fine by tomorrow morning.”

That was good. Randi wouldn’t have been pleased if she put Vanyel out of commission for longer than an evening just for non-urgent research.

“It was Gate-energy that ripped your Gifts open,” Shavri pointed out. “It would make sense that your mind has a very deep association that Gates are dangerous. So you tighten up your channels, because that’s normally what you would do to stay in control – but it goes too far. I think maybe there are two things that happen. One, you’re trying to force more energy through than can fit comfortably, and that causes backlash. On top of that, it seems like your channels start to cramp or spasm, and that’s painful in itself. Even once the Gate is down.”

“Your channels are still quite constricted,” Savil added.

“Mmm.”

“Here, Uncle Van!” Jisa draped the blanket over him, tucking in the edges. “Is that better?”

“Thank you, pet.” Vanyel smiled tiredly. “Shavri, you’re thinking maybe if I didn’t tense up like that, it would actually be fine?”

“Possibly. I suspect you would need to unlearn that association, which wouldn’t be easy since it’s obviously not happening on a conscious level.” 

“That makes sense.” Vanyel yawned. “Sorry.”

“_Ke’chara, _should we get you to your bed?” Savil said.

“Please don’t make me move yet. I just got comfortable.” Vanyel sighed. “Savil, we should talk about Tashir and his mages.” There was the usual hesitance in his voice, the tentativeness anytime he spoke about something that could be considered even vaguely related to Kingdom policy. Savil hated it, even though she understood the reasons why.

“What about them?” she said, almost dizzy from the sideways jump in the conversation.

“Well, for one, we ought to test their Gifts.”

“And find some way of assessing their trustworthiness,” Shavri added.

Jisa’s curious eyes darted to her mother, then back to Vanyel. _I’m not sure if we should be having this conversation in front of her _– but maybe it wouldn’t do any harm. It wasn’t a secret that the Baires mages were visiting, so it wouldn’t do all that much damage if Jisa went around telling people about it, and it might be a good, safe test of her discretion.

Besides, even if she was only eleven, Jisa was very perceptive. And thinking hard about something, going by the lines of concentration on her forehead.

“Jisa?” Savil said, gently. “Did you just have an idea?”

Jisa turned to her, wide-eyed. “I thought maybe…” She hesitated. “I could talk to them. I don’t need a Truth Spell to know if someone is lying.”

A valid point. It might even be better. Having shared her Sight, Savil had a better sense of what kinds of things it showed the girl. More than just a lie in the moment it was said – if someone was the sort of person who would generally be duplicitous, it seemed likely Jisa would be able to tell in the course of a conversation.

“Or we could have Melody speak with them,” Shavri said. “She has significantly more training.”

Jisa deflated a little.

“Maybe Jisa and Melody can _both _see them,” Vanyel offered. “The pretext could be to assess their Gifts, which wouldn’t actually be a lie.”

True. “I think it’s a good idea,” Savil said. “Thank you, Jisa.”

The girl’s beaming smile warmed her to the core.

* * *

Melody raised her eyebrows as Vanyel eased himself gingerly into the chair. “Looks like someone didn’t sleep well.”

“It’s not my fault. Savil had me working with a Gate. I did all the sensible things.” He had been tired enough to fall asleep easily, by the time he made it back to his bed, but the lingering headache had woken him halfway through the night, it had been too close to morning at that point to take valerian, and he had needed a long bath before he was relaxed enough to doze off again.

“So I take it you skipped sparring so you could sleep in?”

“…Er, no.” He hadn’t wanted to hurt Tran’s feelings by cancelling at the last minute, when things were still fragile between them. “I’ve told you, I have a better day if I exercise in the morning.”

“Right. Entirely sensible.” Melody gave him a skeptical look, but let it slide. “Anyway, since you cancelled on me last week _and _the week before, I assume we have some catching up to do.”

“I’m sorry. Randi asked me to cover an audience for Tran.” It had been unexpected, and he wouldn’t have dreamed of saying no. Not when he still felt useless and unwanted far too much of the time.

“And why do I suspect you didn’t tell him exactly what you were setting aside for it?” Melody said, still calmly. “Van, you know Randale would appreciate it if you prioritized seeing me.”

“Yes, well, I don’t actually owe it to him to tell him every single part of my schedule.”

“And you were secretly relieved at having an excuse,” Melody shot back tartly. “Just so we’re clear on that point.”

Vanyel lifted a palm to his forehead. “All right. Fine. I admit it. Seeing you is stressful and tiring, covering for Tran when he’s having a bad day makes me feel useful, and I rationalized that it was worth it without really thinking. Sorry.”

Another raised eyebrow. “I’m not the one you need to apologize to. I got to have an extra two candlemarks free and read a book. Van, I know I’m being pushy, but it’s for your benefit, not mine.”

Vanyel closed his eyes, taking a deep breath. _Center and ground. _“I know. I do appreciate it. Thank you.” It was a little hard, to push out the words, but easier than it would have been three months ago.

Yfandes sent a waft of affection. _:I’m proud of you, Chosen: _

It was one of the days when her mindvoice in his head felt, not quite invasive, but somehow too much. Vanyel took a deep breath, and fought the involuntary urge to raise his shields against her. _:Don’t be proud of me yet: _he sent, opening his eyes and turning back to Melody. “It’s been a good few weeks, actually,” he said out loud. “Though I did have a pretty bad day on–” _:’Fandes? When was that?:_

_:Four days ago, love: _

“Four days ago. I’m not sure why.”

“Any guesses?”

He pinched the bridge of his nose. “I was up late helping Shavri prepare for the Council meeting,” at least they were letting him contribute that much, now, “and then I had a nightmare.” One of the dreams where Yfandes was leaving again, walking away into the darkness, and he woke screaming and flailing for her. She always forgave him for waking her in the middle of the night.

“I ended up going out to the stables for the rest of the night.” The only way he would get any more sleep, uncomfortable bed of straw or not. Sometimes, after those dreams, all he wanted was to go out where he could touch her, make sure she was real; other times, he would end up shielding her out for candlemarks until the screaming loneliness faded and he felt ready to face her on his own terms. Yfandes forgave that as well.

“I got through the morning all right,” he added, “but then I had lunch with Mother and she asked me _again _if I was seeing someone, she never gets the hint, and – I don’t know. It just hit me really hard.” Even remembering, his eyes burned.

“Mmm. I’m sorry.” Melody’s voice was sympathetic, but matter-of-fact. Her eyes darted to the hearth, the window, back to his face. “And then what did you do?”

“I excused myself and went to Lissa’s office and she kept me company for a while.” Without acting like anything was out of the ordinary, which had helped. She had asked him if he wanted to talk about it, he had declined, and then she had gone back to her work, and he had tried to focus on the prospective treaty for the north, both of them occasionally muttering things out loud and making faces at each other.

Tran was actually the one who had asked him to look at the treaty, holding it out like an peace-offering. A very odd sort of gift, to be handed a frustrating task, but it had felt like one.

“I had a meeting with Keiran,” he went on, “that I couldn’t, well, decided not to reschedule, and that was hard, but it always helps a little to have a distraction.” He was still uninvited from most of the Senior Circle meetings, but he occasionally had one-on-one meetings with the other Heralds. Keiran, to his surprise, wasn’t particularly stiff around him – he was sure she was obeying Randi’s orders and holding back the most sensitive information, but she asked for his advice liberally. Joshel was so tense he could barely manage to speak around Vanyel.

He had to keep reminding himself that of course people were still shocked, still unable to fully take it in. _I had fifteen years. They’ve had three months. _

“Then Shavri came and found me and dragged me out to have dinner with her and Jisa, which was the last thing I wanted at the time, but it probably did help, not being alone all evening.” He lifted his head. “I did think about coming to you, when it was after supper and I still felt awful, but it didn’t seem like the sort of thing where talking about it would make it hurt any less. I asked ‘Fandes and she agreed. So I just took a lot of valerian and went to bed early.”

A slow nod. “Hmm. I see.”

He tried to smile. “Honestly, I know you well enough that I don’t actually have to talk to you, to guess what you would say. Every time I found myself thinking, I don’t know, that everything was going to be awful forever and at least I wouldn’t have to worry about the damned treaty anymore if I was dead, I would imagine you giving me that _look_ you do.” He tried to imitate it. “Where you can somehow say ‘oh really?’ with just your eyebrows. And then I would have to admit it was stupid.” 

“Huh.” Melody smoothed down her robes, her hands as restless as usual. “Anyway, I’m glad – it sounds like you coped well. You’re going to have bad days once in a while, and it probably is best to just wait for it to pass, without treating it like it’s all that significant. I wouldn’t have minded shuffling my schedule to see you, even if all I could do to help was keep you company – but it’s true that you can go to other people who can offer that just as well. Possibly better.” A slight smile. “I know I’m stressful and tiring.”

“But worth it.” Vanyel returned the smile. “Melody, I don’t tell you this enough, but I do appreciate everything you’ve done for me.”

“It’s my pleasure.” Melody leaned forwards, reaching for the tray. “Tea?”

“I was worried you’d forgotten tea existed.” Vanyel accepted the cup gratefully. “Anyway, I wanted to talk about a different thing. Yesterday, Savil and Shavri were testing an idea. About why I’m sensitive to Gates, and whether it’s curable. And – somehow that question had literally never occurred to me. This is one of the biggest limitations on my power and it’s damned inconvenient. Hellfires, there are battles we lost that we could have won, if I could Gate as well as I _should _be able to given how strong my mage-gift is. It’s important enough to be worth effort even if it’s a long shot, and...I never thought to consider it. I forgot to be curious.”

“Ah,” Melody said, nodding along.

“And my point is, what other questions am I forgetting to ask?” The panicky confusion that had seized him before was rising again. “What’s wrong with my thinking, that I missed that? Melody, I _have _to be able to look at reality, to reason clearly, or else–”

“Or else what?” she said, very mildly.

He closed his eyes against the sting of tears. It was hard to speak. “Or else I’m going to make the wrong choices.”

“Van.” Melody’s voice was soft. “Hey. Why does it hurt to think about?”

He couldn’t force out any more words past the lump in his throat, so he switched to Mindspeech. _:I can’t afford any more mistakes:_ He forced a breath in and out, tried to center and ground. _:Valdemar can’t afford it:_

Melody held the link stable, her mindvoice clean-edged and sharp, no judgement in it. _:Van, you’re only human. You can’t be perfect all the time: _

_:No, but I can at least be less of an idiot, can’t I?: _His chest ached. _:It was Jisa who thought of it. What’s wrong with my mind, that an eleven-year-old can see things I’m missing?: _Savil hadn’t thought of it either, which made him feel less ashamed, but the cost was the same, in the end – sixteen years that Herald-Mage Vanyel had been substantially less useful to his Kingdom.

A thoughtful pause. _:I think it’s easier for children, sometimes: _Melody sent. _:To be properly curious, it helps if you can hold the world lightly, and that’s a lot easier before you feel responsible for it: _

That did seem true. And yet. _:Leareth finds a way to ask the right questions: _Vanyel sent. _:He feels that weight, and he’s still curious: _

Melody was one of the only people he would have dared bring that example to. He and Savil had almost found their old comfort with one another, but part of her locked down every time Leareth’s name was mentioned. Even Randi would tense up, guarding himself. Melody and Yfandes were the only people who let him think out loud without judgement.

_:Can you please stop comparing yourself unfavourably to Leareth?: _Frustration in Melody’s mindvoice. _:I’m sorry, but he’s had over a thousand years to work this out. You’re being very unfair to yourself:_

_:Not about fairness: _Vanyel felt his hands clench around the teacup in his lap. _:It’s about results. Melody, whatever happens in the next few years could decide the future of the whole world. And I don’t know which outcome I’m hoping for: _A fact that was causing most of his personal problems, right now, but he couldn’t lie to himself, even if it would be so, so much easier to slide towards that offering of solid ground, the certainty that Leareth was in the wrong._ :I could make lots of excuses for myself, but that won’t make the Kingdom any less doomed if I choose wrong: _

Silence.

_:Easy, Chosen: _Yfandes sent.

Five minutes ago, maybe he would have pushed her away, irritated by her attempt to make him feel better. Now, in this moment at least, he just leaned into the wordless comfort of their bond.

_:Hey, it’s all right. I’m here, Chosen. I’m not going anywhere: _

He believed her. Mostly.

_:Van: _Melody’s mindvoice was gentle. _:I’m sorry. I know it’s terrifying, to be in this situation. The stakes just are that high, and – maybe that’s an unfair thing to ask of any human being, but we can’t order the gods around: _The briefest of pauses. _:Yet: _

That one word startled a burst of laughter from him, that was half a sob, and he nearly spilled tea all over his lap.

_:Let me get that: _Melody took the cup from his limp hands. _:Van, I won’t tell you to try to suppress the fear, that’s clearly not going to work. Can you sit with it for a moment? We don’t have to solve anything yet. Just make space to feel it: _

Vanyel curled into himself, bringing his knees to his chest. _I can’t do this. _An endless, whispering refrain. It was too hard. Too much to ask of any mortal – and he wasn’t Leareth, to seek immortality and take on that burden forever. Another five years seemed doable, but not fifty, much less a thousand. _Ashke, I miss you too much to go on forever without you. _

For half his life, he had been counting down the years to the end of it. Was it any surprise that would distort his reasoning?

He remembered sitting with Melody in her temporary room in Dog Inn, years ago. _There’s a distortion in your thinking. _Giving name to the thing he should have already noticed was wrong, that hadn’t seemed like it needed explaining.

In that particular case, it had been a fixable problem, or at least he had been able to trade it for different problems, nightmares and flashbacks of other, horrifying pasts. But he couldn’t step entirely out of his own mind. _You might never stop grieving him, _Lancir had said, and that had been true for sixteen years and didn’t ever seem likely to change.

Except, briefly, in the Shadow-Lover’s realm, the one place where nothing hurt. He could think so much more clearly there, which was a clear demonstration of just how much the background pain twisted everything out of shape.

_:I don’t know what to do: _he sent, helplessly.

_:Neither do I, yet: _He felt Melody’s hand over his. _:That’s all right. We’ll figure something out. One step at a time: _

Yfandes hovered at the back of his mind, not trying to flood him with her light, just watching quietly. Bearing witness. _:I’m here, Chosen: _

A long time later, he uncovered his face, blinking. “I’m sorry.”

Melody, peering owlishly at him over the rim of her teacup, shook her head. “Van, at some point I’ll convince you to stop apologizing for finding bad things upsetting. Anyway. I’m sorry if I came across as dismissive before – I can see why this bothers you, and why it feels important.” She set her cup down, and steepled her fingers together. “Hmm. I do think it’s hard to be genuinely curious when you’re hurting, especially when you’re using your duties and responsibilities as motivation to keep going. You can reason about topics in great depth – and you _do_, you might actually use that as a distraction to make things easier – but there’s a sense in which truly open curiosity asks for a certain kind of playfulness, right?” A flicker of her eyelids. “Thus why it’s so easy for Jisa to be hellishly curious about everything.”

Vanyel smirked despite himself. “She’s still pushing your limits?”

“Every damned day. You ought to be very proud of her.”

Vanyel felt his smile broaden, and then fade, his mind racing ahead. “Melody, remember the conversation you helped me have with Randi, before he told the Senior Circle?” There was no chance she had forgotten, but he waited for her nod. “Randi pointed out that it was hard for him to really consider it, to play with it as a hypothetical, because it intersected with his duty to Valdemar, and that put too much weight on it.”

“I see that.” Melody’s fingers were lacing and unlacing in her lap. “He would need to take it lightly, in some sense, and being the King makes that difficult. I do think that aspect is a little easier for you, exactly because you don’t expect to have final authority on this – you can afford to take risks in your thinking, in some sense. To consider ideas that are bizarre and appalling. Honestly, you’re very good at that particular flavour of curiosity. Most people flinch away from anything too weird. You don’t.”

That wasn’t really a skill he could take credit for; it had taken fifteen long years of talking to an immortal. Although, would even that have been enough for someone like Savil? Maybe not. _There are ways in which she is rigid_, Starwind had pointed out.

Vanyel remembered her long-ago apology to him. _Thank you for putting up with an old woman who wouldn’t rethink her views. I’m sorry it took me so long. _She had only been willing to have that conversation at all because she already trusted him deeply; could she ever have looked past Leareth’s surface?

_I still have to talk to her. _He had been trying to give her space, because Moondance had been right – in the immediate aftermath, it had been too fresh for her to think clearly about. He wasn’t sure when that would change.

“Van?” Melody nudged.

“Sorry, I was woolgathering.”

“That’s all right. I was thinking as well. The example you pointed out, with Gates – it’s not really the same thing as considering strange hypotheticals that someone’s already pointed out to you. The hard part is coming up with the idea at all – there’s an element of creativity to it. Reconsidering what you think you know. I do see how that could be harder for you, especially given that Gates are associated with some very bad memories.”

“Yes.” And he carefully steered his thoughts away from pursuing that line. “Melody, it’s not the only example I thought of. I did the same thing with the Star-Eyed Goddess, not being curious about what She wanted. And…honestly, with Leareth as well. It seems stupid in hindsight, but it wasn’t until four years ago that I really sat down and thought about the hypothetical where I _don’t _die in the pass.”

“Right. Because it was awfully convenient, having that to look forward to?”

Damn Melody, for saying things out loud. “No. Maybe. I don’t know.” He dragged a hand over his face. “Melody, I don’t actually _want _to die!”

“At least, not right this second. That’s good.” A small, sad smile. “Still, I see what you mean. I agree, there’s a distortion in your thinking, and you might still be missing things. I’m happy to try to help.”

“Thank you.” He stifled a yawn. “Um, can I have my tea back, please?”

“Here. Van, I’ll put some thought into this. Try to get creative, you might say.” Her lips twitched. “In the meantime, I think how strong the distortion is varies with how you’re feeling in general. It’s probably always there, a little, but I imagine there are times it was a lot worse. During the war, for example.”

That seemed hard to deny. He remembered the tunnel-vision of it, how only the problem right in front of him had seemed real. “Probably.” Where was she going with this?

Melody leaned forwards. “Van, that means it’s _extremely important _that you prioritize your own wellbeing. Even when it seems like you’re perfectly functional and other things are a higher priority. I know you’ve been focused these last few months on recovering, getting back to normal, and that’s good, but I don’t think you should stop there. Even when things are relatively fine, you’re in pain, and I think that does sink into your beliefs about the world, on a deep enough level that it’s hard to notice or compensate for. Does that make sense?”

“Maybe.” Far too much sense. “Melody, I don’t – what am I supposed to do about it?” It felt like weakness. Like failure.

“There is the usual advice I give people who are unhappy and want to be happier,” Melody said lightly. “Do things you enjoy, and avoid or minimize work that makes you miserable. Spend time with people you care about. Eat and sleep and exercise enough. Take a day off once in a while. You know, the obvious things.”

Her raised eyebrows were very frustrating.

“I have a suspicion,” Melody added, “that you’re not so sure what you enjoy and what makes you miserable. Maybe try paying attention to that for a while?”

“Melody, it’s not like I have any choice about the work that needs doing!” Council meetings were stressful and draining, but if Randi was offering him that trust, the chance to do that one useful thing for the Kingdom, he wasn’t about to turn it down.

“You might be surprised. I could talk to Randi about it.”

This time, he did glare at her. “No! You absolutely will not talk to Randi about it!”

She blinked, calmly. “Then maybe you can, if that’s how you prefer it. Van, I think this is important, and I _can’t _help if you won’t listen to me.”

“…Fine.” He closed his eyes. “I’ll consider it.”


	3. Chapter Three

_– The squat, angular shapes of tents, a whole city of them, silhouetted in the dying sunset – _

_– Endless waves of dry grass, gold-green – _

_– A string of horses, led by a man in robes of vibrant colour – _

_– Men and women on horseback, kicking up dust, racing toward the horizon – _

_– In the distance, a shape. Like the stub of something once-beautiful and majestic, sunk into the earth. Melted, silvery. Growing closer. Huge, so much bigger than it seemed at first, and finally a glimpse of tiny figures at the base, showing the true scale – _

Dara woke with a gasp, half sitting up in a single movement, trying to remember where she was. Sunlight filtered through cloth, a single bar of it falling across a wooden floor. Dust motes in the air. Her hands clenched around two handfuls of her quilt.

“Dara?” A sleepy voice from the other side of the room. “Did you have a nightmare?”

“No, Kerrill. I’m fine.” Her voice sounded shaky and unconvincing, but her roommate didn’t press.

She was in her room, safe in Haven. Not in a strange, distant plain – but somehow it felt like she was. The room seemed half unreal.

_:Rolan?: _

_:Chosen: _The cold blue light that was him steadied her. _:Are you all right?: _

_:I had a dream: _Not really a nightmare, though it had been as vivid as one… _:Rolan, it was so clear. It might be Foresight again: _

_:Show me?: _

Dara opened her shields wider, letting the Monarch’s Own Companion fully into her mind, and offered up the memory of it.

_:I see: _There was something in Rolan’s mindvoice – recognition, maybe, the sense of something falling into the place – but he didn’t add anything more.

_:Why now?: _She still didn’t have the faintest idea what the first dream had been about, and there was nothing special about this particular time… Oh.

_:You are right: _Rolan sent, a hint of pride in the overtones. _:Queen Karis arrives today. Perhaps it is indeed related: _

Perhaps, though she couldn’t think how. _:I might as well get up: _she sent, sitting up all the way. Given the upcoming festivities, the bathhouse might be busier than usual.

She was going to be attending most of the meetings, which was new. Her life never had gone back to normal after the events of winter – or maybe this was the new normal. Randi had sat her down, and said that though she wasn’t ready for full Whites yet, she was more than ready to sit in on meetings with the Senior Circle, and he should have been inviting her sooner. She was still rooming with the trainees, but the King had pulled her out of most of her classes.

It was frightening – she didn’t feel ready – but it was nice as well, to be trusted with that.

* * *

“Karis.” Lissa held out her arms. “It’s wonderful to see you.”

It was the first time they had been together in something like private, though the Queen had arrived nearly eight candlemarks earlier. Lissa had been there as part of the formal greeting party, in an immaculate general’s uniform, standing next to her brother in his formal Whites.

It was always unnerving being at public events with Van. He was so formal, poised and distant, and it felt like standing beside a stranger – though she had asked him flat-out, once, and he said of course it was reassuring to have a friend nearby.

The Queen hugged her back, carefully navigating her voluminous robes and cloth-of-gold headpiece. “I am glad to see you also, Lissa.”

“You’re early.” Lissa glanced around the still-empty meeting-room. “Come on, sit. I know you don’t usually drink, but could I persuade you to have some wine?”

Karis’ eyes narrowed. “Why? There is reason you think I need a drink?”

“…I can’t tell you,” Lissa admitted. “Randi will. Very soon. And yes, if I were in your shoes, I would rather have some wine in me first. It’s up to you though.”

“No, thank you.” Karis lifted her skirts and settled into the chair Lissa pulled out for her. “Oh, that is better. These shoes are quite grand. Comfortable they are not.”

“No, it doesn’t look so.” They made her look considerably taller, though. “Someone decided you needed to be even more intimidating?”

“They are fashionable in Sunhame.” Karis crossed her ankles, hands resting in her lap. Ladylike, but so far from dainty. Her waist was still thicker than before her pregnancy, but it wasn’t a bad look on her; it gave her a certain solidness, less girlish and more a mature woman.

“Guess it’s only a matter of time before they make their way here, then.” Lissa flopped into her own chair, knees splayed, and leaned closer to see. “Hmm. I don’t know if I want to look any taller. Men are intimidated by me already.” Not to mention, the footwear looked awfully unsuited to fighting, and Lissa preferred to _always _wear something she could fight in. Even going out for a night in the taverns, she preferred sleeveless gowns that didn’t impede moving her shoulders, and it was a bonus that they flattered her and were seen as daring.

“You like it, so I thought,” Karis said.

That made her laugh. “You’re probably right.” She leaned back, stretching her arms over her head. “Gods, Karis. You have no idea how happy I am to see you.” She hadn’t been with the last party to Sunhame, so it had been six months. Since Harvestfest – and she usually spent the autumn visit worrying about her brother, working together with Savil to discreetly keep an eye on him. The timing was so unfortunate. That wasn’t something she could talk to Karis about, so she could never explain why she was distracted.

Last Harvestfest, she hadn’t had any idea about a bloodpath mage lurking in the north, let alone any of the far more complicated aspects. _Oh, Van. _There were undercurrents among the Heralds that she wasn’t fully aware of, but she knew that Randi was still holding her brother at arms’ length. Leareth’s ongoing influence on him might have been cut off; Van seemed very happy to leave his Foresight blocked, and put off speaking to the man again; but Lissa knew that some of the Heralds thought it was too late. She happened to think they were wrong, and being idiots about it, but it wasn’t her place to say so. It was a concession that Vanyel was invited to today’s meeting at all, and likely only because Randi didn’t expect any decisions to be made.

She had been trying to guess at how Karis would react for months.

Something warm rubbed against her legs. “Sola?” Lissa said, warmly, bending over so the Suncat could butt her head against her palm. “How did you get in here, anyway?” She had closed the door, and hadn’t heard it open. “Probably the same way you get everywhere,” she cooed. “Magic.”

Amber eyes stared into hers, unblinking, somewhere between disapproving and amused.

“Yes, I know. I’m not supposed to talk about the fact that you’re a magic cat. You’re a good kitty though. What a good kitty.” Sola purred as Lissa scratched behind her ears. “I’m sorry, I should have thought to sneak some fish for you.”

The door creaked open.

“Herald-Mage Savil.” Karis rose gracefully and curtsied.

“Karis, it’s a pleasure.” Savil held out her hands. “You look well, and so does Arven.”

Sola, Lissa noticed, had discreetly taken herself elsewhere, vanishing as magically as she had appeared.

Karis grimaced. “She is a little demon.”

“Walking now, is she?” Savil seemed amused, and not particularly sympathetic. “I hear that’s when they get especially troublesome. First words yet?”

“She will say ‘mama’,” Karis said, a slow smile transforming her plain features to something beatific. _I forget she’s a mother until she mentions it and I see her face_. Karis didn’t seem maternal at all most of the time.

“See if she can say ‘papa’ we will,” Karis added. “So rarely she sees her papa, she may not remember him.”

Randi had seemed pleased enough to greet his daughter, Lissa thought, though not as delighted as she had expected, having seen him with Jisa. Maybe the raven-haired little girl he saw only four times a year, born to inherit a different kingdom, didn’t truly feel like his.

“She has seven teeth,” Karis said, radiating pride. “A problem this is. She will eat anything. Whether it ought be eaten, she does not care.”

Lissa laughed. “I think that’s just how babies are.”

“What’s how babies are?” Vanyel interrupted, slipping in through the door. Like Lissa, he had changed out of his formal garb sometime after the Court supper; he wore one of his Tayledras robes, and the jewel-toned blues and purples were a lot more flattering on him than Whites. Lissa was lucky that her uniforms were blue, and suited her colouring. _Gods, I can’t believe I know that. Mother, this is your fault. _She found herself wondering vaguely what Lady Treesa would think of the platform-shoes, if that trend really did make its way to Valdemar.

Karis seemed unbothered by her own formal wear, but she was always like that. She had taken her headdress off and set it on the table, her one concession to comfort.

“Babies eat things they shouldn’t,” Savil said, reaching to grip Vanyel’s arm, then pulling him into a half-hug. “It’s a well-known fact.”

“It’s true.” Vanyel was smiling, though it was a little forced. “Jisa was especially fond of my focus-stone, which fortunately was on a string so she couldn’t actually swallow it. She tried very hard.” He patted the crystal resting in the hollow of his throat, a chunk of tiger-eye wrapped in wire to make a pendant-loop. Lissa knew that amber worked best for him, but he hadn’t been able to find a piece that was large enough and unflawed after his last one broke.

Karis chuckled. “Paper is Arven’s favourite. She knows it is important – she sees her mother pay it so much attention.”

The young Queen’s Valdemaran was so much better than it had been four years ago; even her accent was subtler. _I wonder if she has anyone to practice it with now. _They weren’t many Heralds in Sunhame now that the kingdom was stable.

“And of course, important things are for putting in your mouth,” Savil said, gratefully lowering herself into the chair that Vanyel had pulled out for her. “I think we’re just waiting for Tran and Randi, now?”

“And Shavri,” Vanyel added. “Tran Mindtouched me, they’re on their way over.”

“Only that?” Karis said, brow creasing. “A meeting of the Senior Circle, I thought.”

“The Senior Circle is already briefed on what we’re going to talk about,” Vanyel said. “Randi is of the opinion that large meetings are unwieldy, so it’s just us for now.” He rested one arm on the table, fingers loose – a deliberate sign of calm, Lissa thought, but it was a lie.

“He thought you might want time to process before the big group meeting tomorrow,” Savil said. “We’re still hoping Starwind and Moondance will make it for that and the festivities.” 

Karis nodded, her face matching their solemn tone, and said nothing.

A minute or so of silence later, the door opened a final time. Randi entered, cane gripped in one hand, Shavri supporting his other elbow. He looked pale and drawn, but he smiled when he saw Karis, and limped over to her, laying a hand on her shoulder. Karis reached up to squeeze his fingers.

It was the most Lissa had ever seen them touch. _Aww, how sweet. _Even if they weren’t in love, at least it seemed like they liked each other.

Shavri and Karis exchanged a smile, and a cryptic look, while Tran brought over a chair for Randi. It was different from the others, Lissa noticed – it came with a cushion. Which seemed more than fair, it was clear that Randi was in pain, but still. _Why can’t they put cushions on all the damned chairs? _Her buttocks were aching already.

“Let’s skip the pleasantries,” the King said wearily. “It’s been a long day and I’m tired.” He leaned forward for a moment, resting his elbows on the table and cupping his hands over the bridge of his nose. “First things,” he said, voice slightly muffled. “Karis, I want to reiterate that I trust you. You’re one of our closest allies, and one of my closest friends.”

Karis made a quiet, listening noise, and waited.

Randi lifted his head, turning to face her. “There’s something I haven’t told you. It’s not personal. Until a few months ago, Herald Vanyel and his Companion were the only ones who knew the full story.”

Karis’ face had settled into the deeper, impassive stillness that always came over her when she was paying a lot of attention to something.

Randi took a deep breath, and then laid his hands flat on the table. “To start. About sixteen years ago, my grandmother learned of a possible threat to our Kingdom, via Herald Vanyel’s Gift of Foresight. I learned of it shortly after I was crowned. Elspeth had taken a wait-and-see approach. From the beginning I wanted to prepare as much as we could, but the war started, and we were quite distracted for a while. It never seemed like a good time.” He paused, catching his breath. “But there was more. Vanyel went to Taver for advice, and Taver advised him to keep it secret, so he did. Except that a few months ago, he learned something new…”

Randi went through all of it, in methodical order, without once consulting the notes that Shavri had discreetly placed in front of him. Lissa wondered if his Companion was prompting him, or if he just did have that much practice recounting the tale.

He was more open about it than she had expected – even more than he had been in the initial meeting where she had been briefed. He didn’t mention Yfandes leaving, but he did touch briefly on the tensions between the Heralds. And the fact that Vanyel was considered too close to the situation to be objective, and wasn’t currently involved in setting strategy – though Randi said it without judgement. He made it sound more like the case of a Herald being exempt from sitting on a Court that judged a family member, say, rather than a suspicion that Van had been deeply compromised.

She watched Karis intently. The Queen’s expression barely changed; once in a while, there was the faintest catch in her breathing.

“That’s all,” Randi said finally, letting his chin sink down to rest in his cupped palms. “Questions?”

Karis blinked a few times.

“I would understand, if you’re angry,” Randi said very quietly. “Looking back, you deserved to know years ago.”

Karis shook her head. “No. I am not angry. A moment, please.”

“Very understandable.” Randi waited.

The silence stretched out.

“Herald Vanyel.” Karis shifted in her chair, turning to face him. “Speak to this mage you have?” Her voice was level, but her grammar was slipping, a sure sign she was nervous and distracted.

“Yes.” Vanyel’s face was unreadable, his breathing steady. _He’s terrified_, Lissa thought – she could see it clearly as the noonday sun, in the slight tension of his neck, and the way his hands gripped the underside of the table, out of Karis’ line of sight.

Lissa wanted to reach over and hold his hand, but there was no way to do it without being obvious.

“You respect him.” A statement, not a question.

“Yes.”

“You think he may be right.”

Silence.

“Maybe,” Vanyel said finally, unfaltering. “I know it’s monstrous, what he wants to do. I don’t want him to succeed at his actual plan. But the general goal, at least the one he’s claiming… I could get behind it.”

Silence.

Vanyel swallowed. “Karis. I know you probably aren’t best pleased by the prospect of someone fighting the gods. I understand that.”

A flicker in her eyes, quickly concealed – Lissa thought it might have been bitter amusement. “No,” the Queen of Karse said. “Yet I am not sure, of what my Sunlord might say to this. Think on it I must.”

“That’s entirely reasonable,” Randi said. “All of us needed a lot of time to get our heads around it.” He slid his chair back. “It’s late, and I need to go to bed if I want to be good for anything tomorrow. I suggest the rest of you follow suit, it’s going to be another long day. Karis, I scheduled the meeting with the Senior Circle after our Council meeting in the morning, before the festival. Is that all right with you?”

“Of course.” A slight incline of her head. “Promise I cannot that I will have good ideas.”

* * *

_My Sunlord. What would You have of Your daughter? _

Karis knelt on the rug before the hearth in the lavish Queen’s suite. It always felt so strange to sleep in these rooms, alone in a bed big enough for four. Twice a year, and the rest of the time they stood empty.

Randi’s advice to the contrary, Karis didn’t think she would be sleeping for a while.

She missed Arven. Her daughter slumbered in one of the bedrooms with her nursemaid, and Karis wasn’t foolish enough to prod a fifteen-month-old awake for cuddles – but if she heard cries leaking under the door, she was minded to barge in and soothe her child herself.

Really, she was the one who needed soothing.

_Vkandis. Hear me. _She had already gone through all the standard prayers, and then the special prayers, words she had learnt by heart decades ago. There had been no answer. On any other day, that wouldn’t have been surprising – her Sunlord had never spoken to her directly before that night in the streets of Sunhame, and never again since.

Her Arch-priest was there with her, of course, and if it were anything else, she would have gone to him – but she couldn’t, not for this. _I cannot betray Randale’s confidence. _Besides, this wasn’t a question that would have a standard theological answer, beyond the thunderingly obvious.

Which Karis was far from sure was adequate. She would have said in a heartbeat that negotiation with a madman was impossible, that they needed to attack, invade, stop Leareth at any cost – even if that price was Herald Vanyel’s life – but Randi wasn’t sure. She knew him better than anyone might have guessed from the little time they had spent together, and she could read the doubt in his eyes. Randi was a deeply ethical man, as committed to his duty as any she had met – a duty that was no less real, for all that he served a Kingdom and not a god. She hadn’t understood that at first, hadn’t understood Heralds, but she did now.

Herald Vanyel’s doubts, she could have brushed off – of course he couldn’t be objective about the situation – but not King Randale of Valdemar. Even if it was horrifying, and she wanted to flee from it and never stop running until the Border was far behind her.

“Sola?” she whispered, tentatively, for the thousandth time.

Nothing.

The fire had burned down to embers, red and sullen. Karis knuckled at her eyes, itchy and watering with fatigue. She had risen from her bed before dawn to prepare for the Gate-journey, and now it was past midnight.

Maybe once the sun was up, it would feel less daunting. Then again, maybe not.

_Vkandis Sunlord, hear Your daughter’s plea. _

No answer at all.

For the twentieth time she closed her eyes, focusing on the breath in her throat, sinking into stillness. _You must make of yourself an empty vessel_, the priests had said to her, when she was a child taking lessons with her brothers in the royal Temple. She remembered how they had laughed under their breath, and passed notes under the pews or thrown spitballs. And she had always listened, and tried to quiet her mind as they asked, hoping that someday the light of Vkandis might flow in to fill her.

No light came. No blazing certainty. There was only the quiet whisper of blood in her ears, the crackling of the dying fire, the occasional creak and sigh of the Palace around her.

_Vkandis. _

Karis sank down over her folded knees, prostrating herself. In that moment, she felt very young and very small. A child again, in a world far wilder and stranger than she had ever expected. _Vkandis. Please. _

...A warm, sandpapery tongue against her ear woke her.

“Stop it,” Karis mumbled, trying to bat it away.

_:Karis?: _Sola’s mindvoice was dry, almost amused. _:Why are you here, and not in your bed?:_

“Where – oh.” She was sprawled on her side, on the wolfskin rug in front of an almost-dead fire, the room inky-black around her. “Sola! There you are. I was calling for you…”

_:I was busy: _

Karis seized the oversized cat and pulled her into her lap. She was normally more respectful with the Suncat, who was after all the formal representative of her god, but right now she craved any kind of comfort. “Busy doing what?” she muttered, words muffled in a faceful of fur.

_:What do you think?: _Sola seemed very unimpressed. _:Asking questions: _

“Oh.” Karis scratched behind Sola’s ears, and received a deep purr in reward. “Were there answers?”

_:Not so much as I would like, I’m afraid. I can tell you more tomorrow: _

“I assume that you listened to our meeting,” Karis added. “I was not sure. Where did you hide?”

_:Under the table: _This time, a real chuckle, if purely mental. _:No one ever looks under the table: _

“I am surprised you restrained yourself from playing with my shoes.” Sola, in one of her rare moments of purely cat-like pleasure, had been delighted by Karis’ gold-polished footwear.

_:It would have been unseemly: _Sola batted at her cheek. _:You should go to bed. Why were you out here?: _

“I wanted to talk to Vkandis.” It felt like that should have been obvious.

_:Any luck with that?:_

“No. I am not sure what I was expecting.” She levered herself up, spilling Sola from her lap – the Suncat made a peeved sound. “Sorry,” Karis said. “I am doing as you said and going to bed. There is nothing more to be done tonight.” Dizzy, she steadied herself against the mantle, reaching to massage her aching forehead. “I hoped…”

_:You hoped for what?:_

“I am not sure. For Vkandis to tell me what to do.” It did sound silly, out loud.

_:Didn’t it occur to you that perhaps our Sunlord is not sure what to do?: _

What? No, that hadn’t occurred to her. It seemed impossible.

_:Vkandis is not all-powerful: _Sola sent. _:There are other gods in this world, and other forces. I am sure He has known of this Leareth already, and laid plans. Perhaps you are one of his plans: _The Suncat twined around her ankles. _:Nonetheless, there is uncertainty. Not even a god can be in all places and do all things: _

That was…bizarre. Nothing like anything the priests had ever said in their dogma. Oh, in some distant, intellectual sense, she had known there were other gods. Vkandis wasn’t worshipped in all lands; she had taken that for granted.

Vkandis was _her _god, who ruled over _her _people, and that was enough. Still, it was unnerving to think that there might be answers He didn’t have.

“What does He wish of me?” she said, half pleading.

_:In the absence of direct orders, which even a High Priest is lucky to hear once in a lifetime?: _Sola butted her calf. _:Follow your conscience. Do what you know is right. That has always been how Vkandis works through His people:_

Karis started to open her mouth, and closed it. _But I don’t know what’s right. _

Was that true? Or did she already know more than enough?

There was no doubt in her at all that Vkandis Sunlord did not wish a bloodpath mage named Leareth to succeed at a dark ritual and create a rogue god. That was foregone. The remaining questions were more complicated – because it wasn’t at all clear that Valdemar _could _defeat Leareth in a war. Even with Herald Vanyel’s power. He was only one man.

That was the other thing she had read in Randi’s eyes. Terror.

Maybe the only viable path to victory was a different one, more narrow and winding.

“They say the Star-Eyed Goddess is involved,” she said absently. “I do not know what to make of this, Sola.” It was messy and complicated and it felt unfair.

_:Then think on it: _Sola dashed away, fading into the darkness. _:But sleep first:_

* * *

“Thank you.” Randi accepted the cup of watered wine from Tantras. They were in his quarters, sitting at the table in his small, private meeting-room. “I don’t want to keep you up much later,” he added, “but I wanted to talk something over with you.”

Tran nodded, waiting.

Randi swallowed. “I want Van at tomorrow’s meeting.”

Sudden stillness. “Oh,” Tran said finally. “That’s a change from our current policy. Why?”

At least he didn’t seem angry or horrified by the idea. Randi closed his eyes, searching for the right words to capture the vague feeling in his gut. “I need his ideas,” he said slowly. “His creativity. This meeting is going to be about throwing out ideas, not making final decisions, and you know Vanyel is the best we have for that purpose.”

“Maybe. But he’s biased.”

Randi inclined his head, accepting the point. “Yes. Tran, we all are. The best we can hope is that our blind spots will cancel out. I take anything Van says with a massive grain of salt, but you have to admit that he’s trying. He’s been very cooperative.”

“He would be. It’s in his interest to earn back our trust however he can.” Tran shook his head. “I don’t think he’s trying to deceive us – I think he believes everything he says – but even if he knows he can’t trust what he’s learned from Leareth, he can’t undo years of influence.”

_Some of that influence might be exactly what we need. _Randi didn’t say it out loud, but he had been thinking it more and more often.

“He won’t learn anything new,” Randi said. “I know you’ve had him helping you with the treaty – good idea, by the way, he’s brilliant with legal contracts. So he’s in the loop with most of the details of the annexation. I would have doubts about that if Van was still having any kind of contact with Leareth – the man could wring information out of a stone – but he’s not, and he hasn’t pushed for it at all.” In fact, the one time it had come up, Vanyel had said in almost pleading tones that he felt nowhere near ready to speak to Leareth yet.

“That is a factor,” Tran allowed. “But you can’t assume he won’t speak to Leareth ever again. You’ve said yourself, we might need him to at some point.”

Randi nodded. “Yes. But, so what? Worst case, a year from now Leareth learns some details on the annexation that are probably public by then anyway.” He shook his head. “I’ll tell Katha to keep her mouth shut about our agents, and Keiran doesn’t need reminding to be discreet about anything confidential to do with our Guard movements. If you think of anything else that Van is better off not knowing, I’ll brief the relevant people. Just – Tran, I want him there. His mind is one of the resources we have, and we need to make use of it.”

“Let me think.” Tran closed his eyes, breathing slowly. Finally, he opened them. “All right. You’ve convinced me it’s safe if we’re careful about information. I’ll avoid dropping any specifics about circuits up north, and I’ll think about what else is sensitive.”

“Thank you.” Relieved, Randi took a longer gulp of his wine.

* * *

_They do know how to make an entrance. _

It was half a candlemark past dawn, which had been the specified arrival time when Moondance had contacted Van the night before – on reflection, Savil had realized that of course k’Treva was much further north and dawn wouldn’t coincide perfectly. She was grateful for the fur-trimmed cloak that went with her formal Whites; the nights were still cold, and the bright morning sun hadn’t yet had a chance to burn away the mist that swathed the grounds around her.

Tantras stood at her side, fidgeting. Vanyel wasn’t there; he was somewhere else in the Palace, hopefully somewhere well-shielded. Whether or not they were right about his Gate-sensitivity being curable, now wasn’t the time to test it.

The tall, open bronze doors no longer showed the shadowy interior of the temple to Kernos, but rather a vibrant clearing of green, shimmering through the Gate-barrier, and Savil’s heart leapt to see three familiar faces.

“We ask permission of King Randale to enter Valdemar!” Moondance shouted, in carefully enunciated Valdemaran.

Randi rose from the chair they had carried out for him. “Moondance k’Treva, I welcome you to the Kingdom. Come across.”

Moondance, holding Starwind’s arm, gracefully stepped across the Gate-threshold, not stumbling at all. It had to be his Gate, and it was as smooth and stable as any Savil had seen. She had taught him what she could of her new techniques on the last visit, during snatched moments, and he must have been practicing – he didn’t seem tired at all.

He was carrying a stick across his shoulder, with both his and Starwind’s bondbirds perched on it. Brightstar slipped across as well, holding his father’s other arm and bearing his own bondbird, a smaller red-tailed hawk, on his forearm, and Savil felt her eyes widen. There had been no mention…

Another three figures followed. Snowlight, Featherfire, and a third figure – it took Savil a moment to recognize Riverstorm, the senior Healer of the Vale. All six of them were as elaborately dressed as Savil had ever seen, robes in cascading layers, a thousand shades of green accented by reds and golds. Vibrant spring colours.

Seconds later, Savil felt her jaw drop, as six _more _figures slipped across. Child-sized figures, but not child-shaped; they had tails, and scaled snouts. She certainly hadn’t expected the envoy from k’Treva to bring their _hertasi. _

She hadn’t seen _hertasi_ wearing much in way of clothes before, either, but these six were bundled up thoroughly. Right – as cold-blooded creatures, they were quite sensitive to temperature, and the spring air would still be much chillier than the Vale.

Starwind swayed for a moment, but Brightstar and Moondance kept him from falling, and he found his balance again.

“Starwind k’Treva,” Randale said, with the formal bow of an equal to another. “Welcome to Valdemar.” 

Starwind nodded solemnly. “It is…our pleasure…to represent k’Treva in this land.” His Valdemaran was slow and halting, but clear.

“I will make introductions,” Moondance said. “This is our son, Brightstar.” The boy was actually taller than Moondance now, Savil noticed, matching Starwind’s height, and his hair was entirely white. With his silver eyes, and skin a few shades paler than the usual for Hawkbrothers, he looked eerie. He seemed to be trying very hard to contain a grin, and he was vibrating slightly from sheer excitement – Savil could feel it radiating from him in waves.

Randi’s smile broadened. “Brightstar, it’s quite wonderful to meet you.”

Savil wondered if any of the others in the greeting party were discomfited by two men having a child together. She had been a little worried just about the fact that Moondance and Starwind were clearly together. There were no mutters, though.

“This is Snowlight,” Moondance said. “She is a scout, and the mother of our son. This is her daughter Featherfire.”

Featherfire bowed shyly. She had grown as well, though it looked like she had inherited Vanyel’s slight build; her head came only to her brother’s shoulder. She was already very pretty, and in a couple of years she would probably be stunning. _I wonder how many boys she’ll be fending off tonight. _

“This is Riverstorm, our foremost Healer,” Moondance went on. “And these are some of our _hertasi_, who live with us in the Vale. This is Aysha, this is Nera, this is Gershan…”

* * *

Vanyel shifted his weight in the chair and tried not to fidget, or yawn. Despite the nerves curdling in his stomach, he could feel the exhaustion weighing him down. _You have no excuse to be tired. _He had gone to bed immediately after the meeting with Randi and Karis – and then lain awake for what felt like candlemarks, unable to relax.

Focus. _Center and ground. _

The Council meeting had gone over, and he hadn’t had time for lunch. During it, Starwind had signed the very short treaty that Vanyel had helped Randi draft, declaring k’Treva Vale – the only Tayledras he could officially speak for – to be formally allied with Valdemar. Progress. He and Moondance had also thoroughly discomfited the Council, which had been enjoyable to watch.

And now Vanyel was in a meeting with the full Senior Circle, the first he had attended in months. He wasn’t sure what had changed. Maybe just the fact that Starwind and Moondance were here, and Randi didn’t want to risk offending them by excluding their Wingbrother.

He should have been grateful for the trust it showed, but it was hard to feel that way – he was incredibly on edge.

“That’s my piece,” Keiran finished. She was visibly unhappy; Vanyel knew she wasn’t exactly pleased by the annexation of the north, though she understood all the reasons for it now.

“Herald Tantras?” Randi said, catching his eye.

“Right.” Seated next to Dara, Tran straightened up from his notes. “Unfortunately, we can spare troops a lot more easily than we can spare Heralds, particularly Herald-Mages. The Web will help, if Savil is correct and we can extend it to cover the area once it’s formally part of the Kingdom – but the range is going to be very, very long. The Forest of Wendwinter is almost two hundred miles north of the current Border, that’s four hundred miles from Haven, and the Ice Wall Mountains are even further.”

“I understand that.” Randi’s voice was surprisingly steady, as he leaned back in his padded chair. _He looks like he ought to have stayed in bed_. “To be honest, it’s possible we ought not to risk our mages that way. I don’t think we can spare anyone from Haven, and the others aren’t powerful enough to defend against serious threats.”

Vanyel tried not to shiver. _Leareth promised he would leave our mage-gifted alone – _but it was unclear how far he ought to have trusted that oath in the first place.

Besides, did any of his past promises still stand? Even if they had succeeded at keeping the secret war-plans within the Senior Circle, the annexation was public knowledge, and Leareth would see the significance in it. It wasn’t an aggressive move, per se, but it was a definite sign of preparation.

His eyes drifted over to Karis, sitting next to Lissa. The Queen had been very quiet in this meeting, speaking only a few times in response to direct questions from Randi. There were dark shadows under her eyes.

“We can spare enough people to cover circuits,” Tran went on. “Particularly in a year, when the next cohort of trainees goes into Whites.”

Vanyel found himself nodding. There had been a significant number of trainees Chosen in the six months after the war formally ended – including, to everyone’s great surprise including his own, a few youngsters from northern Karse. Four years down the line, a few of them were ready to graduate, and most were in their final year of training.

Speaking of trainees, it suddenly seemed as though half the female Companions in Haven were pregnant. He had asked Yfandes if she intended it as well – at just past thirty, almost exactly the age he was, Yfandes would have been very elderly for a horse but was still youngish for a Companion – and she had snorted and teasingly said that she wasn’t ready for another foal, looking after _him _was bad enough.

“In particular,” Tran added, “Shallan tells me we have four strong Farseers in that cohort, and three are Mindspeakers as well. A useful combination of Gifts for border-security.” He glanced over at Shallan. “When could we graduate them?”

Shallan blinked. With her protuberant amber eyes, she always looked startled. “Now, if we had to. I would prefer in six months.”

Randi nodded. “Thank you, Tran, Shallan. Dara, anything to add?”

The girl shook her head. She hadn’t spoken yet in the meeting, though she had clearly been in a Mindspeech side conversation with Tran for half of it.

“Shavri?”

The Healer lifted her head. “There’s another clause in the treaty draft that says we will send them one fully-trained Healer per five thousand people recorded in the first census – that’s about the relative number in Valdemar. If we’re right about the population to the north, that will mean somewhere between fifteen and thirty Healers, which is manageable, but enough to strain our staffing here in Haven. And, of course, we only want to send volunteers. Ideally we can persuade one of our Mindhealers to volunteer, but that’s not in the treaty, I didn’t want to promise it.” 

Jisa would have gone in a heartbeat if she were old enough, Vanyel thought – and if there had been any chance at all that her parents would allow it. Which there wasn’t. _Thank the gods for small mercies. _Jisa wouldn’t thank him for being overprotective, but he didn’t like the idea of her going anywhere near the northern border.

“I expect this to boost our numbers in the long run,” Shavri said. “They must have a number of untrained Gifted, up there, and if we can recognize their Gifts and bring them to Haven, or train them on-site, that will put us ahead.”

Randi nodded. “Good. I was thinking we could send the Healers on circuit, each accompanied by a Herald; the lower end of that range is likely to be around the number of Heralds we can spare, and it’s a way to make it safer as well as covering more ground with the same numbers. Moving on. Herald Joshel?”

The Seneschal’s Herald leaned forward on his elbows. “We can pay for it, but only if we get rid of the tax-credits on one of the other two Borders. We’re still offering some aid to the northern stretch of Karse, and Lineas-Baires isn’t paying the usual tax rate yet, let alone the Lake Evendim bunch. I wouldn’t push on the latter, given that the ink’s barely dry on our treaty with them and we _did _promise five years of graduated taxes, but I’m torn between Lineas-Baires and the south. Both of them have been with us for coming on five years, but they still have significant problems.”

“Queen Karis?” Randi said, pronouncing the Karsite title flawlessly.

“Yes,” Karis said. “Our debts to Ruvan we are still paying – and to Valdemar, on the portion you gave aid. It would strain our treasury, if you were to withdraw that support, but crops have been well, and my people would not starve.”

Randi nodded. “We may stop sending grain and livestock, then. Joshel, if those caravans start coming to Haven instead of going south, can we redirect grain-taxes and livestock-taxes in the north instead, and send those to the new holdings?”

“I think so.” Joshel’s fingers tapped restlessly. “The land up there is less productive than in the south, given the climate, but it’s been a good few years. If we prioritize weather-working in those regions…”

“We can do that,” Savil said. “At least, I can head off any major storms that hit before the harvest, and that shouldn’t impact spring rainfall patterns in the east. Speaking of that, did we end up putting anything in the treaty about weather-working support? I’m sorry, I haven’t had a chance to read through the new draft.”

“Not yet,” Vanyel said quickly. “I wrote up a clause, but we’re still deciding whether to include it. I know it might stretch us too thin.”

Savil nodded and turned back, catching Joshel’s eye. Their faces went blank, sign of a private Mindspeech-conference.

“Thank you,” Randi said. “We’ll come back to it. Joshel, what are our considerations for Lineas-Baires?”

“Lineas is fine,” Joshel admitted, “but Baires is still a bit of a mess. They were relying on Adept-class mages for more of their logistics than I realized, and the survivors couldn’t keep up. Lord Remoerdis has been directing most of the surplus that he’s _not _paying in taxes to us, to feed them while they sort things out. I do think the region must be recovering by now.”

“So it might be worth asking Tashir,” Randi said. “Given that he’s conveniently here. Tran, make a note to schedule time with him and bring it up?”

“Done.”

Randi turned in his seat. “Vanyel, did you…?”

Take a deep breath. “Speaking of Tashir and the Baires mages, I would like to assess the idea of keeping some of them, and training them with the Guard. Based on my assessment with Truth Spell,” and Jisa, he didn’t add, he doubted the word of a young girl would mean as much to the rest of the Senior Circle as it did to him, “they’re trustworthy. Tashir handpicked the bunch he brought.”

Silence.

“I’ll take it into consideration,” Randi said finally. He rubbed his temples. “All right, I think that’s everything to do with the alliance. I want to move on to…hmm.” He was silent for a moment. “Actually, let’s take a minute. I want to talk about our other next steps with regard to Leareth, but I think I’d like everyone to think separately for a bit. Dara? Can you time five minutes again, please?”

Vanyel closed his eyes. It was a good idea, and he felt a surge of warmth towards Randi, but his stomach was churning again as well. _Pull yourself together, Herald. You were expecting this. _

Expecting, sure, but not ready.

He ought to at least try to do the exercise. It would have been awfully nice if he felt less foggy-headed. He took another deep breath. _Center and ground. _

_:’Fandes: _he sent, feeling the slight resistance of the meeting-room shields against Thoughtsensing – he was keyed to them, since he had laid them himself three years ago, but it was still noticeable. _:Can you help me?: _

She knew what he meant – not to come up for ideas for him, necessarily, just to slip into close enough rapport that the space of her mind was open to him as a canvas. It was one of the only things that helped when he was too tired to think straight.

Yfandes, with enviable patience, didn’t tell him off at all for having mostly ignored her during this meeting, making the excuse he had half-prepared moot.

Start with what he knew.

_I believe Leareth is telling the truth, as he sees it. _

It was a feeling deep in his gut, more than a justified set of assumptions, and he couldn’t explain it. There was no single, clear argument; it was a thousand tiny observations, fifteen years of context, and he couldn’t take Savil and Randi and Shavri back to the beginning and walk them through it as Leareth had done with him. That was one problem, and he was nowhere closer to a solution on it.

_I might be wrong. _

He wasn’t sure. Nine of of ten odds, maybe – sure enough that if someone _forced _him to bet money on it, one way or another, he knew on which side he would lay his wager – but it wasn’t a bet he would take of his own free will, not yet. The consequences of being wrong, in either direction, were too high.

_Leareth might be wrong. _

Even if the mage was sincere about his intentions, he might have miscalculated something. Maybe the risk of his plan going wrong was higher than he anticipated. Or maybe… Maybe the cost was higher than it needed to be, and there was another version of it that might achieve the same goal, more safely and with fewer lives lost. Was that the sort of thing Leareth could have missed? Possibly. He was smart, but he wasn’t infallible.

Some of Vanyel’s questions were ones he might ask to Leareth, but he couldn’t trust the answers. _I don’t think he lies to me, but why do I believe that? _

More to the point, Randi and the others had no reason to believe it, and he couldn’t blame them for it. They were reasoning correctly given their starting point. 

He needed more than just an answer for himself – he needed the sort of outside information that would convince a skeptical audience, because he _wasn’t _alone in this. Yfandes was right, it was so much messier to have others involved, but he still thought it came out better, and it was too late to undo.

_Unless I go out on my own and join him. _

The thought drifted up unexpectedly, as though from a clear pool, and Vanyel tried not to grunt out loud. That was…he wanted to deny it, but it _was _an option. If he really and truly thought that Leareth was in the right, and King Randale was in the wrong, then to stay and obey orders would only be another sort of walking away.

_I don’t think that. _As of now, he still trusted Randi more than Leareth – and the relief that surged over him at that thought was another flag. He didn’t want to change his mind. Which meant that he ought to be very careful about trusting his reasoning at face value.

Yfandes, listening, sent a wave of reassurance. _:I know, love. It hurts to think about for me too. We can worry about it when we come to it: _

“That’s five minutes,” he heard Dara say.

It had felt shorter. Vanyel wasn’t sure he had anything new to say. Certainly nothing he felt especially comfortable saying out loud.

His eyelids felt too heavy to lift, so he bent his head a little, letting his hair slide across his face, and kept his eyes closed.

“Shavri?” Randi said. “You have something?”

The sound of cloth shifting as she moved in her chair. “I was thinking about Need.” A pause, then a thud. “For anyone who doesn’t know, this is Need.”

Silence. Vanyel was surprised, that Shavri had suddenly decided to bring up the sword’s existence, but maybe he shouldn’t have been.

Kilchas cleared his throat. “…That’s a sword.”

“Yes. Her name is Need, and she’s also an ancient magical artifact. We think she’s been around for thousands of years, and according to Vanyel, Leareth claims to have met her. If that’s true, then by logical necessity she’s met him. I don’t know if she has the ability to remember the past well enough to be of any use for this, but it’s worth checking.” A sigh. “Unfortunately she seems to be sort of asleep, and the _vrondi _start paying attention to her whenever she ‘wakes up’ a little and uses magic, I think she doesn’t like it. We’ve been trying to figure out a way around that, but no progress yet.”

Lissa interrupted. “What if you took her somewhere the Web isn’t?”

“I did think of that. K’Treva seemed like the only option, and I wouldn’t be able to stay there long.” Another rustle. “Lissa, I would offer her to you and suggest you go instead, but you aren’t a Mindspeaker, and I think she may only be able to talk to someone Gifted. Oh, I forgot to mention, she’ll only take women, and it seems she’s quite fussy.” 

Silence.

“Moondance?” Randi said after a moment. “You have something to say?”

Vanyel forced his eyes open, flicking his hair aside, just in time to see Moondance fold his hands on top of the table. His usually-smiling face was very serious.

“I did not say this before,” he said, in careful Valdemaran. “There was need to speak to the elders of k’Treva, and come to a decision. The decision is now made.” His gaze drifted over to Vanyel, holding a hint of apology. “You of Valdemar know little of the Shin’a’in people, who live to the south of, what you call…?” He trailed off.

“I believe the Dhorisha Plains are due south of Rethwellan,” Randi answered for him. “Bordering on Jkatha.”

Moondance nodded. “Yes. In any case, the Shin’a’in people also serve our Goddess, and have long been our allies. Thus, I know of a thing that is known to few outside the Plains.” He paused. “Do you know of the city that is called Kata'shin'a'in?”

Randi shook his head.

It was tugging at a thread of Vanyel’s memory. Something he had read once, a very long time ago. Not in Haven. A book from his grandfather’s library, maybe. “The Shin’a’in trade city,” he said out loud. “On the border with Jkatha. Where they sell their horses.” And other things.

Moondance graced him with a pleased look. “Yes. That is the place. It is for more than trade – it is the one permanent settlement of their people, and it houses a special place. They call it the memory tapestry. It is very old, and tells the history of the Shin’a’in people, back to the earliest beginnings. The Cataclysm that destroyed half our world.” He paused again, theatrically. “Perhaps this may be of use, to answer the questions we have about your Leareth.”

Quiet gasps.

It made a lot of sense, Vanyel admitted. Leareth had as good as admitted that he had been alive at the time of the Mage Wars, and might even have been responsible in part for the Cataclysm. If they could find out who he had been, in what might have even been his first life…

There was something Moondance wasn’t saying, though. Vanyel reached out along a private link. _:Moondance?: _

The Healing-Adept answered the question that he hadn’t quite put into words. _:I have had dreams. It was not easy, to convince the clan elders that I might share this with your King, an outsider – but I believe it to be important: _

So the Star-Eyed Goddess wanted them to know about the Shin’a’in histories? Interesting.

“That is very useful to know,” Randi said. “Thank you. I realize it must be very significant, for you to share this with outlanders.”

Moondance smiled thinly. “I know of my people’s reputation for keeping our secrets.”

The others in the room still seemed to be absorbing it. Dara was leaning forward, her eyes oddly intent and focused, the freckles on her nose standing out harshly.

“If you’re telling us at all,” Randi said carefully, “then I assume you think there’s a way for us to act on the knowledge. Is there some way that we could be allowed to see these tapestries? I’m assuming they’re not open to outsiders.”

“No.” Moondance looked at Starwind for a moment, and then laid his hand over his partner’s and turned back to Randi. “They would show them to one who is Wingsibling to k’Treva, and has the talisman to prove it.”

Vanyel felt a warm shock in his chest. His own talisman was tucked away in the chest under his bed; he had never needed to use it. Savil had used hers once, he knew. _To save my life. _

“Which means Savil, Vanyel, or Shavri,” Randi said, glancing at each of them in turn. “Or Jisa, but she definitely can’t go.” He squeezed Shavri’s forearm reassuringly.

“I can’t go either,” Shavri said, an edge in her voice. “It’s more than eight hundred miles away. Randi, I can’t be that far from you.”

“I would rather not travel that distance,” Savil added dryly. “I’m too old for exhausting journeys.”

Every eye in the room was suddenly resting on Vanyel.

He felt his cheeks heating. “Randi, I–”

Randi held up a hand, and he closed his mouth with a click.

“I need to think about this,” the King said. “Vanyel, it does seem like you’re the best option, but I need to think hard about whether we can spare you, and I am _absolutely not _letting you go alone.”

Vanyel nodded, keeping his face tightly controlled. There was a writhing heat in his chest – he wasn’t sure whether to be grateful at Randi’s concern, annoyed at his overprotectiveness, or hurt that Randi didn’t trust him to carry out a mission outside Valdemar without supervision.

In the sudden, echoing silence, Dara cleared her throat.

Randi turned to look at her. “Yes, Dara?”

She swallowed, and then raised her eyes to meet his. “Rolan wants me to go.”

_What?_

Everyone else was just as shocked, Vanyel thought. Savil’s face had gone completely blank, mask-like. Tran was aiming a plaintive, puppy-dog look in Dara’s direction, which she seemed oblivious to.

“Well,” Randi said finally. “That’s unusual.”

Dara took a deep breath, and folded her arms across her chest. “You can’t say it’s too dangerous. I’ll be with Vanyel. Rolan is a fighting force in his own right.”

Kilchas cleared his throat again. “How about we don’t risk setting some new record and losing our second Monarch’s Own Companion in a five-year period?”

Savil flung a sharp look at him, and he wilted a little in his seat.

“It’s not a combat zone,” Dara pointed out. “We’ll be traveling through Rethwellan, with whom we’re on quite good terms, and Jkatha, which is formally allied with Rethwellan, so I’m sure we can get a diplomatic letter of safe passage.” She took another deep breath. “And you can spare me. Tantras is a perfectly capable King’s Own.”

“I–” Tran started.

“You _are_,” she said firmly, and turned back to Randi. “Rolan thinks it’s a small risk, and worth taking.”

Silence.

“I have an idea,” Shavri said finally. “That might accomplish two of our goals at the same time.”

Randi sighed, heavily, and pinched the bridge of his nose. “Go ahead.”

“Something I need to check first.” The sword was still on the table in front of her. With two fingers on the hilt, Shavri sent it sliding across. “Dara, touch her for a minute.” A small, sad smile. “Ask her if you’ll do.”

“What?” But Dara went ahead and reached out, closing her eyes.

Vanyel found himself holding his breath.

“Huh.” Dara brought her hand in to her side, and then slumped back in her chair. “I don’t…”

“She’ll take you,” Shavri said, smirking slightly.

Randi turned on her. “Shavri, I don’t see how–”

“I think you don’t understand how Need works,” Shavri said. Definitely smugness in her voice, though there was something else there as well, a hint of reluctance. “She makes you utterly invincible_. _If you’re a woman and she likes you, anyway. Oh, there’s the usual problem that she’ll try to make you run _towards _danger instead of away, but Dara’s got a strong will. If I can ignore Need’s stupider ideas, Dara can too.” She craned over the table, reaching to retrieve the sword. “Also, this gets Need out of Valdemar for a while, and Dara _is _Gifted. Not to mention, if Need did meet Leareth in the distant past, maybe this historical tapestry will jog her memory.”

_Most importantly, you’ve just found a way to get her off your hands for a few months_, Vanyel thought. Though Shavri seemed conflicted about it.

Randi groaned audibly.

“I think we need some time to take this under consideration,” Savil said. “Randi, can we call it a day? The godawful Court reception starts in a candlemark and I could use a nap first.”


	4. Chapter Four

“You’re really thinking about sending him,” Savil said. 

The meeting had broken up, various people wandering off to freshen up or clear their heads before tonight’s reception. She, Tran, Shavri, and Randi were all still in the meeting-room, with the door firmly shut.

“I think it’s well timed, actually.” Randi was staring thoughtfully at the windowsill. “It’ll give him something useful to do – you know he’s been upset that he doesn’t feel like he’s contributing. Even if it’s a long shot, I think this mission could prove quite valuable. And it’ll get him out of Haven for a while, which will take a weight off my mind.”

Savil could guess he thought that was the main point in favour; the fact that the information-gathering might be successful was an afterthought.

It bothered her. “I thought we were fine on that front,” she said. _Is there something I’m missing? _

“As well as can be expected.” Randi shook his head. “But we’re on guard around him. And there are a lot of mixed feelings. It was a very sudden change, going from trusting him implicitly to having to keep him at arms’ length, and…people are having a hard time with it.”

Oh. Savil hadn’t noticed.

“Just having him around rubs it in our faces,” Tran said. “It’s not his fault, but…having a walking reminder that everything we _thought _was true, isn’t. That the Senior Circle is at odds.”

Savil winced. Gods, she had to admit it affected her too, even now – she wanted to be there for Van, and yet even now it sometimes hurt.

“It would make things easier for me on a personal level,” Randi said quietly. “I’m trying very hard to be his friend, and not let this raise a wall between us, but it’s not easy.”

Savil had noticed the awkwardness. Van must have as well.

“It’ll do _him _good,” Randi added. “He’s trying not to let it get to him, but you know it does.”

Oh, she knew it. He felt excluded, even if he couldn’t blame them for it at all; it was a still-raw wound, and even now, there were times that he came to her door in tears.

All of Randi’s points were good ones. The problem was that she was biased. _I don’t want Van to go. _

“We need him for Web-alarms,” she said, with a tinge of desperation.

“We don’t need him.” Randi’s voice was mild. “We managed without for almost a month. I know it wasn’t easy, but our security is hardly going to fall apart, and…honestly, we need to make sure it’s possible to do without him in the long term.”

Savil wrenched her thoughts away from that trail. Not now.

“We’ll fall behind on routine work,” Randi admitted. “Right now we’re actually ahead, though, so I think we can weather it.”

Vanyel had been spending relatively more time on mage-work. It gave him a way to contribute that was innocuous and thus permitted, and he had a tendency to start plowing through the task-list at random times even without being asked.

She forced an unwilling nod. “Could be you’re right,” she admitted.

Silence.

“Dara,” Shavri said suddenly. “You’re going to send her as well?”

“I have to send someone.” Randi’s fingers tapped out a pattern on the tabletop. “Rolan is as well placed as anyone to keep an eye on Van, make sure he doesn’t do anything– not that I think he – but it’s a precaution we have to take. And, honestly, I’m worried about his wellbeing. I’d prefer he’s got a familiar face with him, and Dara’s a good kid. She’ll make sure he’s all right.”

_It should be me_. Savil was the one who was close to Van, not Dara… But it was out of the question for her to accompany him.

“She’ll have Need,” Randi added. “Good plan, by the way, Shavri. Doing this could allow us to hit several birds with one stone.”

Maybe so. _I still don’t like it. _

Randi lifted a hand to rub his forehead. “It’s too soon to make a final decision. I’ll consider it for a few days.” He pushed back his chair. “And let’s call it a night, and celebrate.”

Savil rolled her eyes; a formal Court dinner was nothing like a party. She would fulfil her role, though, talking to stiff-necked old lords until she was blue in the face. And hoping her goddamned brother didn’t make a scene.

* * *

Lissa leaned forward, bringing her mouth close to Vanyel’s ear. “Are they doing it on purpose?” She didn’t actually have to whisper, to avoid being overheard – the buzz of conversation around them, up and down the long table, took care of that – but she kept her voice low.

“Who? Doing what on purpose?” he murmured back.

She pointed with her chin. “Your Hawkbrother friends. They _have _to know that two men being sickeningly adorable with each other in public is something of a spectacle here.”

Vanyel small smile lasted about half a second before fading. “I’m sure they know. No one would dare say a thing to their faces, being that they’re honoured guests _and _terrifying Hawkbrothers. They know it, and they’re enjoying it just as much as you are.

Starwind’s enormous bondbird was perched on the tall back of his chair, looking beadily around and preening. Lissa wasn’t sure where Moondance’s bird was. Flying around the rafters, maybe.

“I think Father’s going to have a brainstorm if they keep at it much longer.” Moondance had cut up all of Starwind’s food for him, and was currently feeding him hothouse grapes one at a time. “You could sell tickets to this!”

Vanyel had lapsed into silence again, his eyes distant.

Lissa jostled his elbow. “Wish it were summer,” she said wistfully. “I’d invite Moondance river rafting with me. He seems like the type who’d enjoy it.”

That earned a weak smile. “He would. And Brightstar too.”

“Ah well. Someday.” She swallowed the last of her wine, and reached for the nearest jug to refill it. “Van?”

He shook his head.

He was missing out, she thought. _This sort of thing is so much more fun when you’re drunk. _Maybe Vanyel felt like given his stature, he wasn’t allowed to be tipsy in public, with everyone watching him. Which was very sad. Damned politics.

Vanyel really wasn’t holding up his end of the conversation. “I thought that meeting went well?” she tried. 

He grimaced. “Liss, let’s not talk about it.”

“Sorry.” She picked out another grape from the basket in front of them, and cast about for a safe topic. “Mother seems to be having a grand time.”

Vanyel followed her gaze to one of the other tables laid out in the enormous, drafty hall, the one where the Council representatives were seated.Lady Treesa, in a gown of pink lace, was twittering away to one of the older lords’ wives, her hands moving in a nonstop dance.

“She likes parties,” Vanyel said dully. “Good for her.”

Lissa turned around, actually looking at his face. “Van, are you all right?”

“I’m fine.”

“That wasn’t very convincing.”

He lifted his head, meeting her eyes. “I’m just tired. It’s been a long day and I didn’t sleep well.”

She had noticed that he seemed to be on the edge of dozing off, in the meeting earlier. “Can you skip the rest?”

“I shouldn’t. Randi needs me showing my face.”

“Hmm. I understand.” That didn’t mean she liked it, or that _she _would have made the same choice in his place, but Van would never shirk his duty even if it made him miserable.

Her brother rubbed his temple. “It’ll be easier to stay awake once we’re up and mingling, after.”

_And you’ll hate every minute of it. _Lissa didn’t particularly enjoy Court receptions. Everyone was in the best finery, sure, but most of the men were _ancient_, hardly worth ogling. She wasn’t allowed to start fights, not even when some young lord said something horribly offensive, and the dancing was very dreary. _I’ll take a night with rowdy soldiers in a run-down tavern over this any day. _Even that one Midwinter in Horn had been more lively than this.

It was harder for Van. It wasn’t that he was worse with people, exactly, if anything he was more skilled than she was at navigating the politics of it, but she knew he found it draining.

And there wasn’t much she could do about it. He was right; Randi needed him here.

She reached under the table and took his hand, where no one could see.

* * *

“You must be Jisa.”

The voice was vaguely familiar. Jisa spun around, and found herself staring into a tunic. Tilting her head back, she eventually found a pair of bright blue eyes, under a shock of blond hair, set in a youthful face that bore a noticeable resemblance to Herald Tantras. The boy wore a copy of formal Whites, except in a sort of grey colour.

“I’m Treven,” he said. He bowed, then stuck out his arm. “It’s a pleasure to meet you.”

Jisa just stared at his hand.

She knew who Treven was, of course. Mama and Papa had told her right away, even before it was announced, that he was going to be Papa’s heir once he was a proper Herald. He was still a trainee now. She knew he was two years older than she was, and that Papa said he was very clever.

Apparently he was friendly too. She wasn’t sure why it annoyed her so much.

Still, Papa would be upset if she offended him. With some reluctance, she reached out and gripped his arm. She definitely wasn’t going to curtsy, even though probably she should have to be proper.

“It’s a big party!” Treven said cheerfully. “Are you having fun?”

She _had _been having fun, until he came along and ruined it by reminding her that Papa was dying.

Which wasn’t his fault, she reminded herself. “Yes,” she said, as politely as she could manage. “I like the music.” Medren was probably around somewhere, but she hadn’t seen him yet; the big hall was very crowded. Stef was with Papa and she hadn’t had a chance to go see him. 

It was the first time she had been invited to the Court part of the festival. Jisa had been looking forward to it, but it wasn’t much like she had imagined. At first she had enjoyed greeting all the lords she knew, but after a while it had started to be overwhelming and boring at the same time. She would almost rather have stayed behind and played with Karis’ baby, or showed Brightstar and Featherfire all the best places for hide-and-seek. They had to be around here somewhere, with their parents, but she hadn’t seen them in ages.

“You like music?” Treven said, eyes lighting.

“Everyone likes music.” Jisa shuffled her feet. She wished he would stop _looking _at her.

Treven was undaunted. “Did you see the Hawkbrothers? I think it’s so exciting that they’re here, and we have a treaty with them now!”

She had forgotten that of course he would know that, he was Papa’s heir and not an ordinary Herald-trainee. “Actually I knew them already,” she said, a little smugly.

His mouth slipped into a round O. “How?” he said after a speechless moment.

“I’ve been to k’Treva Vale,” she said, basking in his shocked silence. “Twice. Actually I’m a Wingsister.”

She half-expected him to frown and ask if she was kidding, but his eyes only widened further. “Wow! Is it amazing there?”

“You wouldn’t believe your eyes.” Now she was having fun. “They have a magic weather-barrier so it’s always summer inside, and hot springs, and there’s a rock as tall as the Palace you can jump off.”

“Really?”

She was enjoying herself far too much. If he was going to believe every word she said… “And they have dragons that breathe fire. They use them to fight colddrakes.”

“Incredible!” Treven breathed.

…Now his enthusiasm was irritating again.

“Jisa,” Treven said. “Would you dance with me?”

She froze. It took her a long moment to find her voice. “I don’t like dancing,” she said stiffly.

“Oh, that’s all right then.” He backed off a step, smile dimming. “I didn’t know. Not everyone likes dancing, it’s all right.”

“I’m going to go say hello to my friend over there,” Jisa said, and turned her back, marching away with her chin held high.

It took almost the whole width of the hall for her stomach to stop churning with a mixture of annoyance and something like jealousy.

At least she had held back from saying what she wanted to, which was ‘your tunic looks like you stole someone’s Whites and then rolled in an ash-scuttle.’ It would probably have gotten back to Papa, somehow, and then Mama would have shouted at her for not acting ladylike.

Not that she wanted to be ladylike. It had gotten a little easier to talk about, after their long conversation, and Mama said she didn’t have to wear gowns to her lessons if she didn’t want to. Today she was wearing a gown, but so was Mama, so it didn’t seem too unfair.

Jisa was starting to feel guilty. _I should have been nicer to him. _What if he was angry? What if he blamed Papa for not teaching her better manners?

Maybe she ought to find him and apologize.

She pictured his face, and still wanted to throw a glass of water at it. How could he walk around being so cheerful, when there was something terribly wrong with the Kingdom? Danger was coming. Papa was terrified.

He didn’t know, she forced herself to remember.

…Somehow that felt like his fault as well. Which meant she was being horribly unfair, but she couldn’t seem to stop herself.

Jisa stormed over to one of the tables and poured herself half a cup of watered wine. She wasn’t really supposed to have wine, but no one was watching.

* * *

_When will it be over? _

Six months ago, Stef would have been overjoyed by the chance to play for the King at the spring festival. It was an incredible opportunity and he would be the envy of every other student at Bardic.

It was turning out to be a lot less fun than he might have hoped. For one, he didn’t much want to tell anyone, because they would ask questions that he didn’t feel like making up answers to. So far, his Wild Gift hadn’t become public knowledge at Bardic. _If anyone else does find out, they’ll be asking me to cure their headaches and stomachaches and I’ll never get any rest again. _An unforeseen downside of notoriety.

For another, he was missing the _fun _part of the public celebrations. Instead he was in a smaller secondary room, half-concealed behind a screen, and he had been there for _ages_, at least six candlemarks, the longest he had ever played for the King at a stretch. Randale had taken his supper here, in a comfortable chair by the fire, and various courtiers and petitioners were drifting in and out to talk to him.

Herald Vanyel had been there for a while, looking very handsome in his formal Whites, but Stef had been too busy and distracted pushing with his Gift to ogle him at all. At least Vanyel had noticed that Stef was there and stepped around the screen to greet him, briefly but warmly. As usual, it had made Stef entirely forget his thread of thought, and he had stammered out some response that probably made him sound like a simpleton.

Queen Karis had joined Randale for a whole two candlemarks, but she hadn’t noticed Stef, or had ignored him, and there had been no chance to step out and introduce himself. If he stopped playing for even a minute or two, the King’s pain started to creep back in. Which was unacceptable. Stef was determined that Randale was going to have the best spring festival of his life, and he didn’t care if he had to play his fingers to the bone.

So far, Stef knew, he had only been paying back a debt, earning forgiveness for his part in the whole disaster with Jisa. Maybe after an evening like this, he would bring his ledger back into the positive, and actually have a chance to earn the King’s gratitude and favour as well. It felt _incredibly unfair_, that he was working so hard to please the King and hadn’t gotten any kind of boon for it.

At least he hadn’t been kicked out of the Collegium, he reminded himself. It had been a close thing. _Don’t be such an idiot next time. _

He was blocking his own pain as well, and had been for candlemarks – if he stopped, his head started aching and his fingertips throbbed, which was very distracting.

He reached the end of the song, and paused for just a moment, grasping for the cup of water that one of the servants had replenished. He hadn’t been singing loudly, it would be too distracting, but he could push more of his Gift through if he crooned under his breath, and his throat was dry and scratchy from it.

The room blurred for a moment, and Stef blinked hard. He was too hot. _What time is it? _He couldn’t see the time-candle from where he was, and he must have been too deeply absorbed in the music to notice the Palace bells.

He sighed and reached for his lute again. Lose himself in the song, and maybe the rest of the night would pass quickly.

The notes floated up into the air, like an offering to a god that wasn’t listening.

“Papa?”

That voice was familiar, pulling him out of the daze he always slipped into when he played. _Jisa? _

“Good evening, pet. What a lovely gown!” Randale’s voice was relaxed, no hint of pain or tension. Stef let himself feel a surge of pride.

He found his hands had stopped moving on the strings. _Keep playing, you idiot. _Another push with his Gift–

The room went foggy again, and Stef felt himself start to slide from the stool. He tried to catch himself, but his arms were suddenly weak, and he was too dizzy to keep his balance.

–Something skipped, and he found himself on his side on the floor.

Running footsteps.

“Stef!”

“Gnng,” Stef mumbled. He had tried to say ‘go away’, but words weren’t working right.

“Stef, please wake up!” Jisa was shaking his shoulder, and shouting, both of which he wished she would stop – it felt like someone was tap-dancing inside his skull. Finally, he managed to force his eyes open, even though the dim light hurt. “M’awake,” he mumbled.

Jisa’s concerned face swam in his vision. “Don’t move. I’m getting a Healer. Papa, don’t get up! I’m going to find someone with Thoughtsensing.” 

Stef giggled, and started coughing. She was so _bossy_. He closed his eyes again, shivering – he had been hot before, but now he was very cold.

Jisa felt his forehead. “Stef, are you ill? You should have said something!”

More footsteps. “What’s this?” The voice was familiar.

“Andrel, come over here. There’s something wrong with Stef. He collapsed in the middle of playing!”

Stef heard the floor creak as someone’s weight settled next to him, and then felt another, larger hand brush his forehead. “Stefen, lad, what have you done to yourself this time?” A pause. “Oh. I see.”

“What is it?” Jisa interrupted.

“Just ordinary backlash. He’s overused his Gift and drained his reserves empty.” Andrel’s voice was disapproving. “How long was he playing?”

Stef was starting to feel a little better, like strength was flowing into him rather than out. It felt cool and soothing.

“Since before supper,” Randale’s voice drifted in.

“Gods! It’s midnight – that’s almost seven candlemarks. Didn’t anyone think to check on him?” Stef felt the Healer’s hands under his shoulders. “Come on, up we get. That’s it. Take some deep breaths. Good.” A pause. “Jisa, fetch me some hot water from that tea-tray, would you? And mix some of the sugar in it. Stefen needs something sweet to drink.” His hand was on Stef’s forehead again. “Stef, lad, have you been sleeping well?”

“Mmm-hmm,” he managed.

“I don’t think he is,” Jisa said. “Stef, you aren’t going to bed early enough, are you?”

Tattletale, he thought, very loudly in her direction. It was _impossible _to go to bed early enough, when he had to be up half a candlemark before the sun even rose. Stef needed Medren, who was more of a morning person, to shake him awake and practically drag him out of bed, if he was to make it to his lessons with Katha on time.

“Sleep is very important,” Andrel said, patiently. “Particularly for us Gifted, and especially at your age, Stefen. You’re still growing and developing your Gift. It’s important that you take good care of your body.”

Healers were so _irritating. _Andrel was nice enough, but he always talked like Stef was a rather stupid child.

Half a candlemark later, Stef was in his own bed, well tucked in. With the fire blazing in the grate, he was finally warm enough. Healer Andrel had left him there with strict instructions to rest the next day and drink plenty of fluids. He had seemed more amused than worried. _Happens to most of us once or twice_, he had told Randale. _He’s young. Still learning his limits. _

“Stef?” Jisa said. “Would you like another cold cloth for your head?”

“Please.” Stef wasn’t used to being in pain – but Andrel was right, he didn’t seem to have the energy left to use his Gifts at all, not even to numb his own headache. That hadn’t happened in years, not since the incident with the river, and he hadn’t liked it any better then.

Maybe he should have been embarrassed that he had collapsed in front of the King. He wasn’t, particularly; he was rather enjoying all the attention. _Besides, now he knows how hard I was trying. _

“Stef, I’m annoyed with you,” Jisa said, conversationally. “You were being stupid.”

_I wanted to impress your father the King _didn’t seem like the wisest answer.

Jisa narrowed her eyes at him. “Stef, I don’t like it when people lie to themselves. Who are you trying to convince that you’re completely self-interested?”

“Hey!” Stef turned his head to glare at her. “Jisa, stop reading my mind.”

“I’m not.” She folded her arms. “Melody made me swear I would never ever ever use my Sight again without permission. Which I already decided. Because it’s wrong.”

“Well, don’t,” Stef said a little sullenly, turning his head away. “Jisa, I’m tired. Can’t you let me sleep?”

“It’s your own fault,” Jisa said coolly. “I thought you were more sensible. You’re as bad as Uncle Van, honestly.”

An eleven-year-old girl’s disapproval shouldn’t have stung so deeply. Stef closed his eyes. “Go away, Jisa.”

“Fine, I will.” A pause, and her voice softened. “I hope you feel better soon."

* * *

The day after the spring festival, everyone was tired. It had been a long night of celebrations. Starwind had resigned his pride and stayed in bed. Moondance hoped King Randale would do the same.

It was a beautiful day, soft blue sky full of puffy clouds, mist lying over the grounds. Brightstar had been up with the dawn, eager to see as much of Haven as he could. He had already arranged a tour with Jisa. 

_I ought let him enjoy it. _They were only staying one more day; three days was the longest the elders had wanted to risk taking away _both _Healing-Adepts. Moondance had taught the communication-spell – not Vanyel’s but Leareth’s – to several other mages, and they could contact him if the need was desperate, but he preferred to avoid urgent Gates.

Right now they were walking about the Palace grounds. Moondance was walking, rather, while his son ran to and fro with Jisa, staying vaguely within earshot. Featherfire had elected for a quieter morning, following Riverstorm around on her tour of the Healers’ building and their herb-garden; the child wasn’t Gifted with Healing, but she had shown interest in learning herb-lore and basic techniques. It would be very useful, since she was likely to be a scout someday like her mother.

Snowlight, from what Moondance understood, had undertaken to offer a lesson in woodsmanship and tracking to some of the Herald-trainees, at least those students who were willing to come in on what was nominally a holiday – which, for the privilege of a lesson with a real Hawkbrother, was apparently most of them.

Above his head, Daria soared. She was elderly for a bondbird now, and she would likely rest on his shoulder most of the day, but she was enjoying the spring sunshine and the new surrounds. Every once in a while she would reach in and pull him into sense-rapport, just to share the exhilaration of it.

_It is good to be here. _And to be out in the open, not needing to hide. There had been strange looks, of course, but that was to be expected. _They must needs grow used to us. _

Moondance wasn’t sure why that seemed so important. It would have been easier to explain if it had been a dream, or one of those odd feelings that came onto him sometimes, but it wasn’t. Nor was it a clear explanation he could give to Starwind in words, and so he mostly hadn’t talked about it. It was still difficult to have complex conversations with his partner; Starwind would lose track of his thoughts, and then become frustrated with himself and need to be soothed. Jisa’s quick intervention on the previous visit, reinforced with Shavri’s help over several days, had helped, but Moondance doubted Starwind would ever be as quick as he had been once.

_The things we have lost. _Like a shadow passing across the sun, or a cold draft creeping under his clothing to raise goosebumps on his skin. _Never going to be the same. _

He had grieved it over and over in the past eighteen months, slowly wrapping his mind around the enormity of the change, and the confusion of whether he could even allow himself to be sad. _I still have him. _

A precious gift. It was enough. And yet.

“Moondance?”

The voice startled him from a half-reverie, and he turned. “Tashir?”

The young man jogged to catch up with him. He had grown – half a head taller, broader around the shoulders, the last traces of baby-fat gone from his cheeks and jaw.

“I’ve been looking for you!” he said. “You’re leaving tomorrow, right?”

“Unfortunately, we are.” Moondance held out his arms, offering the embrace that he could guess Tashir wanted. “There is work that needs be done in the Vale, and we must not neglect it for long.”

“I understand. I feel the same about my duties back home.” Tashir hugged Moondance back, holding him tightly for a long time.

“How do you find your duties?” Moondance said, a moment later, falling into step with the young man.

“I’m getting accustomed to it, finally.” Tashir smiled. “Everyone was very understanding, back when I had no idea what I was doing. It’s been a little hard to convince them that now I _do _know, but…time will tell, I guess. That’s what Jervis says. He said people fall into habits and take a while to change.”

Moondance nodded sagely. “It is always an adjustment for those around you, when you grow.”

“That’s it exactly.” Tashir rubbed the back of his neck, scowling. “I could wish they would stop telling me I need to marry and produce an heir. I know it’s my duty, but…”

“Yet it is not an easy thing. I can understand that.” Moondance smiled gently.

“It’s stupid.” Tashir kicked a stone off the path. “I should just be able to, I don’t know, man up and do the necessary. Pick one of the nice girls my Council keeps lining up, I mean, they’re all nice, and Jervis said I could make any one of them happy…” He lifted his head, eyes plaintive. “Why can’t I just do it?”

“It feels hollow,” Moondance guessed. “To bind a woman to your life, when you do not and perhaps cannot love her.”

“Love isn’t really the point of a state marriage. It’s about alliances and babies.”

Moondance shook his head, braids swinging. “I would not know of that. It is not our custom.”

“I wish it wasn’t ours either. But the world is what it is.”

There was such resignation in his voice; it made Moondance’s chest ache. “Your Companion,” he said finally. “What does he say?”

“He says I shouldn’t do something that makes me incredibly uncomfortable. That I’m already more than meeting my duty to Valdemar, and I should take all the time I need.”

“I am glad.” It sounded like good advice.

Tashir kicked another stone. “Just, you know, I don’t want it to be like my parents all over again.”

“You are not your parents.” Moondance hoped his certainty came through in his voice. “You are your own person, Tashir, and you walk your own path – and surely your Leshya would not have Chosen you, were you not someone who could and would do right by others.”

“That’s exactly what Leshya keeps telling me.” Tashir made a face. “I’m not saying I would _mean _to hit my children, just… I get angry sometimes.”

“So does everyone. It is very human.” Moondance closed his eyes, the ache of memory surging in him. “You needs not fear it.”

“Also what Leshya says.” Tashir flashed a sheepish smile. “I know. I’m not my father. I can choose to be better. It just feels… I don’t know. Dangerous.”

“That is very understandable also.” Moondance reached out to grip his shoulder for a moment, before letting his hand fall again.

They walked in silence for a minute or two.

“I wanted to ask you about something else,” Tashir said finally.

“Yes?”

The young man hesitated for a moment, chewing his lip. “The Heartstone,” he said finally. “Herald-Mage Savil and Herald-Mage Vanyel said that’s what it is, in the Palace.”

“We know of it,” Moondance said quickly. “Our Wingsister alerted us.” But clearly Tashir wanted more. “She did say that perhaps we ought look at it. I agree. Yet it would surely need be a Healing-Adept. We are few, and your land is far.”

“I understand.” Tashir scratched behind his ear. “It’s not causing any problems right now. I’ve been trying to talk to it, and it doesn’t seem worried.”

Moondance felt his eyebrows rising. “The Heartstone speaks to you?”

“Not in words. It’s very strange. If I sit next to it, in the shielded room, and go into trance, I can sometimes pick up concepts. It’s gotten easier with practice.”

Moondance blinked, impressed. He wouldn’t have expected the young man to experiment on his own initiative, much less to succeed at it. _Perhaps I do not give him his due. _

“It’s sort of like the Web,” Tashir went on. “I guess that’s built on a Heartstone as well, although it’s here in Haven – but the Web is everywhere in Valdemar, and Lineas is Valdemar now. I’ve had training on how to use the Web. I can’t do very much because I’m not a Herald-Mage, but all Heralds can use it now.”

“Fascinating.” Moondance had meant to make more time to examine Vanyel’s work – after all, he and Starwind had advised on it – but things kept coming up. “In any case, one of us ought to see to your Heartstone. They are not meant to go so long without the attention of mages.” It must have been a very, very careful and thorough working, to have lasted this long at all without maintenance and apparently without problems.

“But it’s a long journey, and you can’t Gate since you haven’t been there before,” Tashir said. “I was thinking…”

“What?”

The young man glanced over, eyes like un-screened doorways. Open, trusting. “Herald-Mages Savil and Vanyel can both Gate to Highjorune. If they’re willing, they could raise a Gate while you’re here – it would save us the journey back on foot – and you could go through and have a quick look around, and later on you would be able to Gate there if you wanted.” He smiled tentatively. “Herald-Mage Donni did that, when Herald-Mage Vanyel was rescuing me after the…things.”

Moondance felt his eyes widen. Why hadn’t that occurred to him?

Because a Gate was a great deal to ask of any mage, just for a peek around. Perhaps it was worth it, though, to save a future journey of months – a journey that might otherwise be put off again and again, slipping into the indefinite future. It wasn’t so much to ask of Savil, either, now that she had mastered a more efficient version of the spell.

“I will ask,” he allowed. “Perhaps the answer will be no. A Gate is a tiring thing.”

“I understand that. It was just a thought.” Tashir scuffed his feet along the grass. “Herald-Mage Savil is stealing half my damned mages to train with the Guard. At least they’re finally working on a talisman to give the other half, so they can use magic without the _vrondi _swarming them.”

Moondance nodded. “Vanyel spoke of it to me.” Vanyel had offered to give him, Starwind, and Brightstar each a talisman if he finished the design in time, though it seemed doubtful he would.

“Right. I forgot, the _vrondi _must bother you as well.” Tashir scratched the back of his neck. “Most of the Baires mages are willing to do workings anyway, once I sat them down and explained that they weren’t losing their minds, but they hate it. I have to rotate them, give them days off so they can get some sleep without being watched.”

And he found it distasteful, Moondance could guess, ordering his people to do something unpleasant.

_If we might stay longer, I could help my Wingbrother with the talisman. _There were so many competing things to do. He had squeezed in another candlemark for a concert-Sight meld with Shavri and Jisa, observing the Bardic-Gifted youngster – Stefen, that was his name – while he worked his odd Gift and soothed away King Randale’s pain. It was certainly a bizarre Gift, one he had never seen before. Moondance still wasn’t sure whether it was _possible _to copy its effects with one of the more common Gifts, Healing or even Mindhealing. Jisa, who worked so instinctively with her Gifts, was the closest to partially replicating it, but even she wasn’t close.

Tashir was looking down at his feet again, self-consciousness in the set of his shoulders. _He is grown, but still so young_.

“Moondance?” he said finally.

“Yes?”

“…I’m really, really glad to see you again, that’s all.”

* * *

“You’re sure about this, _ke’chara_?” Savil said, setting a mug of tea in his hands before settling back into her oversized chair.

Two days had passed since the spring festival, and the official decision was made. Vanyel and Dara were going south.

“No.” She watched as Vanyel cupped his hands around the warmth, steam rising. “It seems like the most promising option. I’m not delighted about going through Rethwellan, but they are our allies.”

Oh. Savil had forgotten about that aspect. “Van, they’re not going to cause trouble.” She lifted one foot up onto a stool, then the other. _Ooh, that’s better._ “You’re a war hero.”

“Yes, and I’m sure they’ve heard the other rumours. Savil, you _know _how they feel about people like me.”

She felt a rush of sympathy. “I’m sorry, Van.” Were there any other options? “You could always travel through Karse instead.”

“It’s fine.” A crooked smile, but the tension around his eyes meant it wasn’t fine at all. “Going via Karse will add a third to the distance, and you know their roads are still awful.” He glanced away towards the window. “Savil, don’t worry about me. This ought to be safer than most border circuits.”

“I’m not worried about you being attacked by bandits.” Savil stroked the rim of her wine-cup with one finger, trying to find the right words, that wouldn’t make him defensive, and then giving up. “I’m worried about you being by yourself out there, and too far from home to Gate back.”

“I won’t be by myself,” he reminded her.

“You’ll understand that doesn’t make me feel much better.” Savil lifted the cup to her lips, peered at him over the rim. “You barely know Dara.” Not to mention, she was only sixteen. A very grown-up sixteen, but still.

“That’s not true. Savil, she was in the Work Room with us. I trust her.”

Oh. Somehow she had forgotten. “There is that, isn’t there? It changed things.”

Vanyel turned back to face her, slowly. There was an odd piercing look in his silver eyes. A moment later, he reached out with a Mindtouch. _:Maybe it didn’t change enough. Savil, we have to talk: _

She felt her back stiffen. _:Talk about what?:_

His deep reluctance was clear, but he forged ahead. _:About Leareth: _

_:We’ve already talked about Leareth: _

_:We haven’t: _Vanyel crossed his legs, balancing the teacup on his knee. _:Not the way I mean. Savil… I know you don’t understand. You think I’m wrong to even consider for an instant that Leareth might be right: _

She had been trying to steer away from that particular bottomless pit. _:Van, I–:_

_:Let me finish, please: _He took a deep breath. _:Savil, we’ve been over this before. I care about you. I trust your judgement. Last time we disagreed on something like this, we were able to talk about it, and I learned something from hearing your side of it: _

Wordless refusal rose up in her. _:That was different: _

_:Why was it different?: _

Savil shook her head. Why wouldn’t he leave it alone? _:I don’t know: _

Vanyel was silent for a moment, still holding the open mindlink – she could feel his hesitation, confusion. _:Can we try to figure out?: _he sent finally. _:Savil, I know it’s uncomfortable, but it would mean a lot to me, if we could try to talk it through. I don’t want to leave this unresolved when I don’t know how long I’ll be gone: _

It would be easier if they left it unresolved, she thought – it would buy her time. Time for the screaming in her mind to settle down into whimpers, so that she could think.

Kellan, listening quietly in the back of her thoughts, surged forward. _:Chosen, you’ve tried ignoring this. I’m not sure it’s working: _

Damn it, she was tempted to push him away and shield him out, but that would be rude, and he was probably right; he nearly always was. Savil closed her eyes. _I can’t – _and yet, maybe she did owe Vanyel that much. She had promised he wouldn’t have to do this alone, and she could pick up his desperate loneliness in the overtones.

_:All right: _Those two words were all she could manage – the cry of refusal was filling her, locking down her mind, every part of her flinching away from the abyss. Like the ground shifting under her. _I don’t know what anything means anymore. _

_:Can I say some things?: _Vanyel sent. _:Tell me if I’m wrong: _

Savil nodded.

_:For one: _Vanyel went on, _:I imagine you’re afraid that it might push us apart, if we try to talk about this and we can’t manage to agree: _

That part should have been incredibly obvious.

_:I’m scared as well: _Vanyel sent. _:But it’s already pushing us apart: _

A wave of something like dizziness, not physical but purely mental.

_:Steady: _Kellan sent. A pause. _:He’s right, you know: _

She had been trying not to think about that part either, but not-thinking about it wouldn’t make it go away. Maybe it was better to get it over, like ripping off a bandage. If she could find the courage.

_:I know, ke’chara: _she sent. _:I have been avoiding it, and I’m sorry: _

_:I don’t blame you. I’ve been avoiding it as well: _Eyes still closed, she heard the rustle as he shifted position. _:Savil, I know this is big. It has implications on everything you thought you understood, and you haven’t had time to absorb that: _

Savil nodded slowly.

_:And maybe it doesn’t feel safe to talk about it, before you’ve had a chance to wrap your head around it? Especially to me: _

Was that why? It still felt so hazy in her mind, fog rising.

Center and ground. Anchor in the moment, lean into the nebulous fear that had been keeping her awake at night as she ran over the last fifteen years in her mind. She opened her eyes, facing him.

_:Van: _she sent. _:I know this isn’t fair, but…I feel like I don’t trust my own mind, around you: _Laying out those words between them, she knew in her bones that they were true, but not why. Yet.

_:Because I make clever arguments for conclusions that seem monstrous, and you can’t find a specific flaw but the end result still seems wrong? So it makes you distrust your reasoning: _

Despite herself, Savil rocked back slightly in the chair. _:Yes. That: _

Several beats of silence, Vanyel blinking rapidly.

_:I know that feeling: _There was deep sympathy in his mindvoice, and pain as well. _:I’ve felt like that every damned time I spoke to Leareth: _An unsteady breath. _:It hadn’t occurred to me, but it does make sense, that you might feel that way about me: _

And it wounded him deeply – he didn’t say that part, but he didn’t have to.

_:I’m sorry: _she sent. _:I know you’re not trying to manipulate me: _Not on purpose, at least. Her discomfort seemed deeply uncharitable; Vanyel wasn’t like Leareth at all.

_:No. But the point still stands: _He shook his head, a wisp of silver hair slipping across his eyes. _:Leareth might not be deliberately tricking me, but he might still be wrong. And I might be wrong:_

She nodded, feeling the sting of threatened tears.

Vanyel leaned forward. _:Savil, listen. I don’t want you to agree with me. That’s the opposite of what I want!:_

_:What?: _She blinked a few times. _:But–:_

_:I want you to come to your own conclusions: _He lifted a hand to rub his forehead. _:I mean that. Because the stakes are so high, and I can’t afford to make mistakes. I need a check on my reasoning. More than I’ve ever needed anything, Savil: _

Savil flinched. Why did it hurt? Anchor in her body. Vanyel’s eyes felt like a weight on her skin, there was a desperate, prickly pressure in her chest and it was hard to draw breath. Trapped, that was how she felt. Resentful. It was too much to bear.

_Stop asking for something I can’t give._

Oh. Like a punch to the gut, and hot, bitter shame rose. It was so deeply unfair of her, to be angry with Vanyel for needing her.

_:It’s understandable, Chosen: _Kellan sent, reassuring. _:The situation is unfair. To him, and to you. But he isn’t wrong about the stakes: _

Which meant it was her duty to…what?

To help Randi make the right decisions, that would keep their Kingdom safe. She was a Herald.

A surge of something like bitterness. _My duty is to Valdemar. Not to strangers who aren’t even born yet._

There was an off note there, the feeling of tripping. Almost certainly, Vanyel thought his duty was broader than that. No, not exactly duty, it had never really been that for him. He cared about people’s lives – about _all _the people.

She remembered how upset he had been about Stony Tor. He wouldn’t be angry with her, for declaring that everyone outside of some imaginary lines on a map wasn’t her responsibility, but he would think she was making a mistake.

Maybe she was.

_I just want the world to make sense again. _

She could still remember what it had been like to be Chosen. Kellan had looked into her eyes, and for an infinite moment she had fallen into the blue, bathing in the relief of it, everything that was confusing suddenly come clear. She had memorized the words to the Herald’s Creed her first week in Haven – and, yes, in the years after that, she had found new nuance there. The world wasn’t anywhere near as black and white as she had thought at fourteen.

It had come painfully, bit by bit. Each increment of losing that innocence, that youthful idealism, had hurt like a knife.

Vanyel had never flinched away from that. _All information is worth having, _he would say, quoting Seldasen.

Who, after all, had been a Herald, and a deeply ethical man. Savil had reread his treatise, recently, and Vanyel was right – he made a lot of the same points that Leareth did. An uncomfortable thought.

_:Savil?: _Vanyel sent, tentatively. _:I know you wish it was different. So do I:_

She caught the fringes of the thought behind it. _Wishing won’t change anything. _

_:If it’s too late for us to reconcile on this: _he sent, _:then that’s already true. Ignoring it won’t change it. So we should find out whether or not it’s the case, sooner rather than later: _

How could he talk about it like that? Distantly, almost casually, as though he was discussing someone else’s life.

Vanyel snorted. _:Melody pretended to be you and made me play out this conversation with her about ten times, until I could do it without crying: _

_:What? Really?: _

_:Really. She said if I didn’t talk to you before I left, she would have Yfandes toss me in the river: _

Savil stared at him – and then, despite her best efforts, started laughing. And couldn’t stop. Wheezing, she dabbed at her eyes. _:Van, I’m sorry–:_

_:No, it’s fine. It is kind of funny: _He leaned back, crossing his legs, chuckling sadly as well. _:Yfandes said I would deserve it, too: _

Kellan was radiating quiet smugness in the back of her mind. _:Hey!: _Savil protested. _:Have you been plotting this?: _

_:I wouldn’t go quite that far: _Love, worry, sorrow…and a hint of amusement. _:We were worried about the two of you: _

Damned Companions and their backchannel plots. Savil wiped her eyes on her sleeve, drained her teacup, and bent to set it on the floor at her feet. She swallowed, and patted her knee. “Van, come here,” she said out loud, a little thickly.

He stood up, slowly, and made his way to her, and she reached out and wrapped her arms around his midriff. “I love you, _ke’chara_.”

“I know.” He rested his chin on the crown of her head, and they stayed like that for a long time.

_:You’re right, I think: _she sent finally, switching back to Mindspeech. _:About what I’m afraid of. And why I don’t feel ready to talk about it: _She took a shuddering breath. _:I very much don’t want it to be the case that Leareth has a point. But what I want doesn’t change reality:_

Silent acknowledgement.

She tried to gather her thoughts. _:I, just – Van, I’m sorry, that I’m no good at this. I’m just an old woman who’s set in her ways: _

A chuckle, quickly stifled. _:No, you aren’t:_

_:You aren’t: _Kellan added. _:Chosen, I know it’s hard, but you were never one to back down from a challenge: _

_:Shut up, horse: _She turned back to Vanyel. _:I need more time. But, I will think about it. And when you get back, hopefully I’ll have something of use to add: _She reached up to stroke his hair. _:Just make sure you do come back, you hear me?:_


	5. Chapter Five

Shavri hesitated outside Vanyel’s door, unsure why it was still so hard to knock_. _It wasn’t like she was angry with him anymore; that was water passed under the bridge months ago. And yet.

_:Shavri?: _Vanyel must have sensed her outside his door, even if she couldn’t feel much at all through his wards. _:I’ll be right there: _

Her heart shouldn’t have been suddenly hammering in her chest, and her mouth shouldn’t have been dry.

The door opened. “Come in,” Vanyel said, with a tired smile. “What is it?”

Shavri knew that one of her flaws was a tendency to avoid things, to put off having a conversation until she was sure that her own thoughts were in order. Maybe that was fine sometimes, but she had just run out of time – Van was leaving in less than a week.

“I wanted to talk to you,” she said.

“About you-know-what?”

“About ethics.” Her fingers brushed the hilt of the sheathed blade at her waist. _Help me, Need. Give me courage. _It was more frightening than she liked to admit, knowing that she would be giving Need up for months – she had started relying on her. A bad idea on principle.

“Oh.” Vanyel’s gaze sharpened slightly, as he bolted the door behind her. “Have a seat. Wine?”

“Please.” She perched on the stool he pulled out for her. “Van, how are you feeling about this mission?”

“Fine.” There was something closed-off in his face. _He doesn’t want to talk about it. _Fair enough, and it wasn’t really why she was here. “Van, I’m not sure where to start…”

_:It’ll be easier in Mindspeech: _he sent, pulling her in to the link. _:You want to understand how I can possibly think Leareth might be right: _

Of course he would have guessed. _:Yes: _She accepted the wine-cup he proffered. _:Van, I can’t wrap my head around it. But I know you. If you’re not sure, there’s something to it: _

A slow nod. He sat as well, pulling in one knee to his chest and resting his chin on it. _:Thank you, Shavri:_

_:For what?:_

_:Having faith in me. It doesn’t make sense to you, but you’re deciding to be curious, instead of deciding I must be corrupt or insane: _

She sipped the watered wine. _:I mean. I think I can start to understand why someone like Leareth might act the way he does. If he’s telling the truth, and he found a way to be immortal just to give himself more time to fix the world. And then tried and tried, for centuries on end, and nothing ever worked. Of course he would start to feel like the gods were against him: _She could have sympathy for that.

_:Mmm: _Vanyel acknowledged. _:Shavri, that is one way to look at it. I don’t know… It feels too convenient. A world where he’s well-intentioned, and wrong for understandable reasons, and I can think he’s not a monster but still know I have to stop him: _His hands fidgeted with the fabric of his trews. _:What about the world where he’s been trying for centuries, and came to believe the gods were against him, and he’s right?: _He shook his head. _:Ethics is hard and confusing. It’s not always intuitive. Sometimes the things we think of as virtues just aren’t enough, and sometimes the right answer doesn’t feel that way. It does feel monstrous, what he’s proposing, but I can’t just write it off: _

Shavri frowned. _:How likely do you think it is?: _

_:I don’t know. Haven’t figured out how to think about it yet: _He shook his head, helplessly. _:Hellfires, so much of the way I think about ethics comes from Leareth, and I don’t – I shouldn’t just trust that at face value. I need to question it, figure out if he’s missing something huge. Only I don’t know if I’m clever enough, and I haven’t got the faintest idea who else to go to for advice: _

His doubt and misgivings were clear in the overtones, and Shavri felt an answering ache in her chest. _It’s not fair. _That the world was so full of uncertainty; that the right answer might be beyond any human being’s ability to figure out. _Maybe none of us are smart enough. _

_:I want to help, Van: _she sent. _:Maybe I’m not as clever as you, and I’m certainly not as clever as Leareth, but I can try: _

Vanyel snorted. _:Shavri, I would’ve said you’re cleverer than I am. Remember, I’ve had fifteen years to think this through. Give yourself time: _

Her hands clamped around the cup, knuckles whitening. _:Van, how much time do we have?: _

_:I don’t know: _A shrug. _:Maybe it’s too late; maybe it’ll all be for nothing, in the end. We still have to try now. Do our best with what we know, what we have, and hope that we’re in one of the worlds where we still have a chance of winning. Whatever winning means: _

Why did those words make her eyes burn with the threat of tears? Shavri closed her eyes. _:You’re still hoping you can ally with him: _

_:Yes: _The word seemed to hang between them._ :I’m trying not to let it distort my reasoning, that I want a particular conclusion, but – yes. I don’t want to kill him, Shavri. Not when as far as I can tell, no one else in the whole entire world, no one in all of history, has tried to do what he’s doing: _A pause. _:He wants to end death itself, Shavri. To figure out how to make everyone immortal: _

She flinched. _:You didn’t say that before: _

_:…I guess I haven’t wanted to think about it: _The weight in his mindvoice settled onto her, more like sand than stone. _:And it seems like an afterthought, with all the rest. He wasn’t sure it would be possible. Still. Isn’t that some kind of indication that he really does care?: _

_:Maybe: _Shavri allowed. _:But if he’s going about it the wrong way, if he’s the wrong person for this – maybe it’s better to have no one trying: _

_:Damn it!: _A thud, as Vanyel’s hand smacked the desk next to him. _:Shavri, my whole life, I’ve been the wrong person for what I’m supposed to do. Maybe Leareth isn’t the right person to save the world. Maybe no one is. What are we supposed to do about that? Accept that this is just the way it is, littles starving in the streets and all? Should we give up on things ever being different?:_

_:That does seem to be what most people do: _A catch in her thoughts, like stumbling on an uneven stair. _:…Maybe that’s the problem: _

_:Leareth would say so: _She could feel the quiet misery radiating from him. _:I think he’s lonely, Shavri. He doesn’t want to be doing this on his own. Gods, he said… Shavri, he said I’m one of his few friends:_

Oh. She could see why that would get to Vanyel. _:He won’t hesitate to kill you: _she sent._ :To kill anyone who might get in his way. You have to know that: _

_:I know: _There was an aching, desperate pressure in his mindvoice. _:Because he’s done the math, and all the lights – all the people who aren’t even born yet, who could exist and be happy – all that is worth more than a single life. Or ten million lives. That’s what he would say:_

The sick horror rose in her throat.

_:It’s probably not the easiest introduction: _Vanyel sent. _:That you’re starting with the ten million deaths, and trying to understand from there. Leareth let me work up to it slowly: _

_:Or fed you his arguments in the most convincing order: _Shavri pointed out. _:Maybe it’s a good check, to see if they still seem as compelling to an outsider: _

_:…That’s true: _A surge of gratitude. _:Shavri, it means a lot to me, to have your help in this: _Vanyel was silent for a moment, rubbing his forehead. _:There’s something I do, which honestly I probably did get from Leareth. Look at what you know, all the pieces, and notice that your mind tries to tell a story that fits them together. It’s tempting to making that story the best one, for some value of best – the most convenient, the world you wish you lived in. And it’s a useful exercise to tell the least convenient story as well, and notice that from where you are, they might both be true. Does that make sense?: _

Shavri nodded. _:I think so: _Turning it over in her mind, she tried to find flaws. If a mage called Leareth had wanted to seduce Vanyel over to his side, was this something that would have helped in that goal?

Maybe, but maybe not. It seemed an indiscriminate sort of weapon – Vanyel might start to question his own beliefs, but surely he would question Leareth’s theories as well, and if he succeeded, he would end up believing whichever of them was actually true–

Of course, it seemed very likely that Leareth deeply believed he had the truth on his side.

_:One of the least convenient stories here: _Vanyel sent, _:is the version where Leareth is right about the kind of thing that someone has to do in order to solve anything permanently, but if he goes on to attempt his plan alone, he’ll fail. Maybe because he’s missing some crucial assumption, because he doesn’t have anyone else who fully understands his plan, who can check his work. And in that world, if I were to join him, hells, if both of us were to join him, if all the Heralds in Valdemar were on his side – that might make the difference. Having allies he could trust: _A breath, in and out. _:Could you imagine that being the case?: _

Shavri squeezed her eyes shut and pressed her palm over her eyes. Focus. Try to look at it from all the angles. _:Not really: _she admitted finally. _:But I suppose I can’t rule it out. Van, the problem is that we hardly have any pieces to fit together in the first place: _

_:And there are too many different scenarios that are compatible with the information we have: _She felt rather than saw his nod. _:I know. We need to learn more, somehow. From a source that isn’t Leareth, or a book he wrote. Which is why I’m going south, on what I hope isn’t a fool’s errand: _

Shavri touched the hilt of the sword again. _:Maybe Need will help us: _

_:Maybe: _Vanyel’s eyes had gone distant. _:Just trying to remember what Leareth said about her… That she had crossed his path more than once over the centuries. That her purpose was very specific and she mostly left him alone, although he did say she was irritating: _

Shavri, despite herself, laughed. _:Very true: _

_:He said another interesting thing. That he thinks she’s more than just an artifact – that she used to be a human, an Adept-class mage, who somehow imbued her spirit into a sword. He thinks a god would have been involved; he compared her to the Companions: _

_:Oh: _It was too much to take in at once.

_:Can I have a look at her?: _Vanyel sent.

Shavri nodded and unclasped the sword. She did feel something – like the feeling of hands clutching at her, but only in her mind. It reminded her of Randi in the mornings, how even in his sleep, his arms would tighten around her when she tried to move.

_:He’s going to hand you back to me in a moment: _she sent, only realizing a moment later how silly it was to reassure a bloody sword.

Vanyel drew the sword from its sheath and laid the blade across his knees. He closed his eyes and his face slipped into blankness.

_:I don’t know: _he sent, a long time later. _:She’s, not shielded exactly, but she hides when I try to look, and what you said before seems right – she speaks a little, but it’s like someone talking in their sleep: _He re-sheathed the blade and passed her back.

Shavri hooked the sword to her belt again. Never mind how silly it looked, wearing a sword-belt over her Healers’ robes. Both things were silly, in truth; she hadn’t been near the House of Healing in two weeks.

_:Probably a good thing Dara’s getting her for a while: _Shavri sent, thought with reluctance. _:I can’t do her justice. Dara’s a better fit: _

She felt Vanyel’s wordless protest, but he didn’t push. _:Does she still nag you to hand her over to Jisa?: _was all he said.

_:Huh. No, not especially: _Shavri patted the blade. _:Guess I finally earned her respect:_

* * *

Vanyel rose from trance with effort, letting go of the timeless peace of the Web and falling into his body. The blue-and-silver was still there, in the back of his mind; it always was.

He felt the others around him shaking off the daze as well.

_:Did all of that make sense?: _he sent.

_:Yes: _Kilchas’ mindvoice was gruffly impressed. _:Doesn’t mean we can pull it off as smoothly as you, boy: _

Vanyel didn’t bother to bristle. Kilchas, who had served Valdemar longer and suffered for it harder than most, had the right to call him ‘boy’ if anyone did. _Gods, he’s one of our most senior Heralds now. _Though his wrinkled-apple face was misleading – he was only fifty-six, twenty years Savil’s junior.

_:Sandra and will practice while you’re gone: _Kilchas added. _:Won’t we? We’ll show you up someday: _

_:I look forward to it: _Vanyel opened his eyes, blinking. “Savil has a few other tricks,” he added, out loud.

“I do have to work without the benefit of Farsight,” Savil said wryly. “I can make scrying-talismans for both of you – they cut the power requirement considerably. Or Sandra can make copies off my design. Honestly, you’re better at this sort of thing.” She frowned. “Sandra, what happened to your eyebrows?”

Vanyel hadn’t noticed it until Savil pointed it out, but it was true – Sandra’s eyebrows were mostly gone. _I must be out of it. _He was fairly distracted; there had been constant meetings, crammed into Karis’ brief visit, and on top of that he had been packing and planning their route.

“Oh.” Sandra looked self-conscious. “I had a bit of an accident in my workshop.”

“She should have known better.” Kilchas seemed very unimpressed. “Sandra, why didn’t you use the stillroom at Healers’?”

“It was just a quick test!” Sandra looked affronted. “I woke up in the middle of the night and I had an idea I wanted to try out.”

“And you set your own face on fire,” Kilchas grumbled. “Serves you right.”

Sandra smacked his arm.

Vanyel wasn’t sure whether to be amused or irritated with her. “Sandra,” he said. “What sort of safety-spells do you have on your workshop?”

She waved her hand carelessly. “I made a talisman with your weather-barrier spell built into it, that I can activate to put out fires in an emergency – it pulls the heat outside my window. Anything really dangerous, I do at the Healers’ Collegium.”

“I’d still like it if you had a way to call for help,” Kilchas muttered. “Since we all know you get ideas in the middle of the night and you just have to test them immediately.”

“Please, Sandra,” Savil agreed wearily, already on her feet and opening the door. “I hate when my former students get themselves killed.”

“Maybe I can do something.” Vanyel stood as well, waiting out the slight dizziness – it had been a long morning, properly showing Kilchas and Sandra all the techniques he had developed for Web-work, helping them adapt the ones that relied on Farsight or Fetching. Which was a good exercise for him anyway. His damned Farsight still wasn’t working right. Melody hadn’t been very apologetic about it either. _I did the best I could_, she had said, giving him a mildly irritated look, as though _he _was the one being unreasonable here.

He followed Savil out into the hall, Sandra and Kilchas on his heels, and turned back to catch her eye. “Sandra, I’ll come by tonight and see if I can tie some kind of distress-alarm into the Web for you. How does that–”

** _PAIN!_ **

–For an instant, Vanyel was somewhere else. He couldn’t feel his body, only falling, terror, a moment of agony that cut off with deafening suddenness.

“Van!” A voice, off in the distance. 

He found himself slumped over on hands and knees, dizzy, it felt like he might fall right off the earth.

“–Has he ever had a spell like this?”

Vanyel stared at his own fingers, white-knuckled, gripping the stone. He couldn’t remember where he was.

“Looks like Gate-exposure, but there wasn’t–”

Everything was still spinning. He closed his eyes, nauseated by it.

“Van, look at me–”

Someone – two someones – took his shoulders and eased him into a sitting position. Hands pushed his head down between his knees.

_:Chosen!: _Yfandes was in his mind, adding to the sheer cacaphony. _:Van, are you with me? What–:_

The Death Bell started to toll. Vanyel felt it inside his skull, ricocheting like stones tossed down the sides of a well.

_Dakar. _

Someone whimpered.

“Wha–” But Sandra’s startled exclamation cut off halfway, and he knew that she knew.

“Vanyel?” Savil’s voice was still there, her hands cool on the back of his neck. “_Ke’chara, _hey, talk to me?”

He swallowed. “Where…?” Piece together the fragments of memory. _I was in the Web-focus room… _“Dakar,” he mumbled.

“I know.” Savil was stroking his hair. “Is that what you felt?”

“Don’t know.” It was hard to speak; his lips were numb and it felt like his mouth was full of sand. “Falling. Pain.”

“That’s what I sensed as well. It seemed to hit you a lot harder.”

Vanyel tried to sit up, and felt a hand clamp down on his shoulder, gently but firmly restraining him. “Easy there,” Kilchas was saying. “You don’t look so good. We’ve got a Healer coming.”

“Sandra,” Savil started, “did you–”

_:We found them: _Yfandes interrupted, and Vanyel heard the gasps and sighs from the others; their own Companions must have been reaching out. _:He was riding the obstacle course with his Masha, and they must have taken an obstacle badly. He was thrown off. Broken neck. It was nearly instantaneous: _Deep sorrow in her mindvoice. _:The shock took Masha along with him: _

Not uncommon when a Herald died suddenly, but for it to have happened in peacetime, in the capital… Vanyel could feel Savil’s grief, leaking. She had known Dakar a lot better.

_:Chosen, are you feeling all right? It hit you awfully hard:_

No, he wasn’t. His head throbbed and he was still dizzy; it felt like backlash, but different. He tried for humour. _:Fat lot of good I’m going to be, if I collapse every time a Herald-Mage dies nearby: _

“Kilchas, Sandra, did you–” Savil started.

“No, we didn’t feel the pain.” Sandra’s voice was absent. “I did know right away, who it was.”

Well, neither of them had been in the original Web-working.

_:’Fandes, why was it so bad this time?: _He had noticed it before, during the war, but it usually didn’t make him collapse and nearly pass out.

_:It’s the first time a Herald-Mage has died within such a short distance of you, when you were this close to the Web-center: _Yfandes sent. _:Mages are still more deeply tied in, even now: _

_:Why does it affect me so much worse than Savil?: _She had been in the initial Web-working as well.

_:Because you made a lot more of the actual modifications? I don’t know, love: _

It was starting to catch up to him now; as the quasi-physical pain faded, the grief crept in. _Oh, gods, Dakar… _He had worked with the younger Herald – Dakar had rarely used the title of ‘Herald-Mage’, since he wasn’t much of a mage and his strong Gift was Fetching. Though he had been so damned proud of his tiny Gates…

Nine.

That was how many Herald-Mages were left, across all of Valdemar.

* * *

Mama ruffled her hair. _:Are you ready, pet?: _

Jisa took a deep breath, and squared her shoulders. _:Yes. I’m ready: _She tried to keep her voice level, adult, even though she was almost ready to burst with pride.

“Karis?” Mama said out loud.

“I am ready.”

The Queen of Karse stood with her arms clasped behind her back. She was dressed all fancy again, in cloth-of-gold with her giant sun-shaped hat. Jisa didn’t really understand it – she was just going to step through a Gate. Mama said it was because she needed to Make An Entrance on the other side.

Behind her, Arven was in her wet nurse’s arms, babbling. She didn’t seem to mind Gates at all. Jisa thought it was funny how many grownups didn’t like walking through a Gate. Gates were so much fun.

All the other Karsite nobles were lined up in rows behind her, carrying their things. All of the goodbyes were already said. They were ready to go.

If Jisa was sad about anything, it was that Papa wasn’t going to see her do this. She could tell him afterwards though.

“Vanyel?” Mama said.

“I’m ready.” Uncle Van was sitting down on a stool in the hallway, staring so hard at the open door to the small Palace chapel that Jisa thought his eyes might burn a hole in the altar behind it.

Mama put her hand on his shoulder, and closed her eyes. _:Jisa: _she sent a moment later. _:Go: _

Jisa closed her real eyes, centered and grounded properly, and opened. Not fully. She wasn’t supposed to use her Mindhealing Sight for this, which was annoying, but Mama and Uncle Van thought her Receptive Empathy and a close Mindspeech link ought to be enough.

It felt wonderful, to be asked to do something real.

_:Uncle Van: _She took a step closer, so that she could put her hand on his other shoulder. He was very tense, like knotted balled-up string. _:Try to relax: _Jisa sent, and Pushed, as hard as she could, until her forehead tingled and colours started to wiggle against her closed eyelids. _Calm. Everything will be all right. You’re safe. _

She felt Uncle Van’s muscles go limp, and Mama caught him before he fell off the stool. _:Pet, maybe a bit less than that?: _

_:Oh: _Jisa felt a little embarrassed. _:Sorry: _

_:…That’s better: _Uncle Van’s mindvoice was soft around the edges. _:Putting me to sleep is probably overkill: _

_:Go slowly: _Mama prompted. _:I’m right here. I’m not letting anything happen: _

Aunt Savil was there was well, behind the Karsite nobles. Ready to shut down the half-Gate if it turned out Vanyel wasn’t strong enough to reach that far. 

Which wasn’t going to happen. Because everything was going to be fine. Uncle Van had been practicing for _days _on little baby Gates, learning the direction-part of the spell that Aunt Savil had invented, that made it easier. Jisa had been helping for those too, and so he had been able to stay calm, and it hadn’t hurt him.

She knew he wanted to be more nervous for this, because those had been pretend-Gates, like toys, and this was real, and further than he had ever tried to go before. Five hundred miles, Mama said. Jisa could scarcely imagine a distance that big.

But everything would be all right.

Uncle Van raised his hands. Jisa didn’t feel the energy start to move, because she wasn’t a mage, but she could almost imagine she did.

She could feel Uncle Van trying to tense up, but she wouldn’t let that happen. Push harder with her Empathy – not too much, or he would lose his focus too much, but just enough.

_Everything will be all right. _

‘Just enough’ was actually quite hard. Jisa was enjoying every minute of it, feeling the strain like a muscle pushed to its limits. It was so rare that she got to _really _use her Empathy. 

She didn’t feel the energy, but eventually she saw the glow of the Gate against her closed eyelids.

_:Threshold is complete: _Uncle Van sent, his mindvoice still vague. _:Going to hold it stable a minute, see if I can…: _

_:Very good: _Mama sent. _:You have lots of energy to spare: _

_:I know: _His mindvoice was awed. _:It doesn’t hurt: _

Of course it didn’t hurt. Jisa wasn’t going to let it.

When she had been talking about it with Mama, before, Mama had brought up the idea of having Stef help, but Jisa had pointed out that wouldn’t really solve it. Stef could block Uncle Van’s pain during the Gate itself, but he couldn’t prevent him from tensing up and hurting his own mage-channels, which was the problem they were trying to fix.

The thing she hadn’t said out loud was that she didn’t want Mama to ask Stef for anything else right now, because he would would feel like he had to, even if he was too tired – and she didn’t care what he said, or what he was telling himself in his head, it wasn’t just because he wanted to impress the King and earn a place in the Palace. Maybe it was that too – maybe it was _mostly _that, she was still trying to wrap her head around Stef’s relentless drive to collect all the favours – but it wasn’t the only thing. He cared.

Especially about Uncle Van. Jisa thought it was hilarious. She had virtuously restrained from teasing him, or telling him how obvious it was. His mind almost looked a different shape around Uncle Van, though she hadn’t been able to figure out what was different before Melody made her promise to stop using her Sight.

_:Now to Sunhame: _Uncle Van sent, and there was a hint of stress – and pain – in his mindvoice. Jisa had been forgetting to watch as closely as she should have, and she eased out more of her Gift at him, like measuring flour into a mixing-bowl without spilling it. She felt him relax again.

_:Easy: _Mama sent. _:Slow down: _

Jisa couldn’t tell what Mama was talking about – maybe she was sharing Uncle Van’s mage-sight.

It didn’t take very long, though, before there was a blaze of light. Uncle Van flinched, and Jisa Pushed again, nearly as hard as she could. The most difficult part of the spell was done, the Gate was up – it wasn’t so likely she would make him lose it if she disrupted his focus a little.

“Let’s go!” Herald Tantras’ voice, booming over the knot of people – he was there too, somewhere in the back. “Move!”

_:Uncle Van, are you all right?: _Jisa sent, squeezing his shoulder.

_:Surprisingly: _She felt him reach up, his fingers closing over hers. _:Thank you: _

Jisa felt his reaction as each person crossed the Gate, but it wasn’t quite fear or pain. She wasn’t going to let him feel either of those things.

“That’s everyone!” Herald Tantras shouted.

“Goodbye, Karis!” Jisa opened her eyes for a moment and waved. “Goodbye, Arven!” The baby was giggling, reaching back for the Gate; she had clearly enjoying going through and wanted to play with it for longer.

_:I’m taking it down: _Uncle Van sent, and Jisa closed her eyes and remembered to throw her Gift at him. Not done yet…

When the last of the Gate-light faded, Uncle Van sagged again, nearly falling into Mama’s arms.

_:Are you all right?: _Mama sent.

_:I think so: _Jisa could feel him trying to collect himself. _:Doesn’t hurt. Or only a little. Normal backlash. Gods, though, I could go to sleep right here on the floor…: _

_:Don’t you dare: _Mock-outrage in Mama’s mindvoice.

_:You’re right, it was easier to do this sitting down: _A hint of a chuckle. _:Thank you for that idea. Wouldn’t have ever occurred to me for some reason: _

Jisa knew that Mama had spent quite a lot of time figuring out all the things that the King would normally do standing up, but that were actually fine for Papa to do sitting in a comfortable chair or even lying down in his bed.

In the close mind-link, Uncle Van must have sensed the edges of her thoughts. _:Maybe that nice padded chair next time. Awfully hard to keep my balance when you were blasting me like that, pet: _

_:I wasn’t blasting you!: _she protested. _:I was being careful!: _

“We’re all done here.” Aunt Savil’s voice. “_Ke’chara, _how are you feeling?”

“Ready for a nap.” His voice was slurred.

“He didn’t draw on my energy at all, during,” Mama said. “Or Yfandes, either. That was all done on reserves.”

Aunt Savil looked impressed. “Gods. Even I can’t manage that distance on reserves alone.”

“Well, he is supposedly ten times more powerful than you,” Mama said wryly.

Uncle Van shook his head, and immediately looked like he regretted it. “That’s not reserves, it’s more like the width of my mage-channels. I can throw ten times as much fire per second if I’m linked to a node, but I probably don’t have much more in reserves. I mean, reserves come from life-energy, and I’m not ten times as alive.”

That was fascinating_. _Jisa had never thought about what it meant for a mage-gift to be stronger – or, come to think of it, what it meant for Gifts in general to be stronger or weaker. Like Empathy. Melody was a Projective Empath too, but she had barely a trickle of it compared to Jisa. Even Jisa’s Mindhealing Gift was stronger, although not ten times as strong.

_Thank the gods, _she imagined Melody saying to that.

Uncle Van was yawning, and trying to hide it.

“Off to bed with you,” Aunt Savil said. She rolled her eyes when Uncle Van grimaced. “I know you don’t want to stand up. Get it over with.”

“I can help!” Jisa offered. She was tired as well, from using her Gift so hard, but it wasn’t so bad. She had been getting stronger.

_I did it. _A slow, spreading warmth in her chest, brightness filling her, until she felt like an overstrained waterskin ready to burst open with it. _I did it I did it I did it–_

* * *

Randi blinked, dazed. “Tell me again why you think you have to do this?”

They were in his quarters, and Melody was there; Vanyel had showed up with her in tow. It wouldn’t be the first time in recent months that she had joined them to help with a potentially-fraught conversation.

Vanyel met his eyes without flinching. “It’s been almost three months since I spoke to Leareth. That’s already a little bit suspicious, and he’ll have noticed all the activity in the north. When I go, I won’t have any way of speaking to him, because Melody won’t be there to undo the block. He might start to wonder if I’ve decided to cut contact with him and go straight to hostilities.” He took a breath. “If I tell him that I need time to process this, I think he’ll understand. He said it took a hundred years for him to come to terms with it. And…I know you don’t necessarily believe this, but _I _believe he keeps his promises. I can ask him to swear that he won’t take any action against us until I speak to him again.”

Randi rubbed his temple. “And then you’ll have Melody block your Foresight again?”

“Yes.” A crooked smile. “Maybe this time she can leave my Farsight alone. I might need it on this trip.”

Melody made an irritated sound. “It’s a technique that was literally just invented. By an eleven-year-old. You should be grateful we had the option at all.”

Vanyel ducked his head. “Sorry, Melody. I know you did a much better job of it than we could reasonably expect.” He turned his eyes back to Randi. “What do you think?”

_I don’t know what to think. _The reasons he gave made sense, but all the same, if he really was thinking about joining Leareth, and wanted a way to communicate that… “I have no way of knowing what you say to him in the dream,” he pointed out.

“Not true.” Vanyel looked away. “Put me under Truth Spell after and I’ll recount it. I give you permission. And…hells, you can write the draft of what I’m to say, if you want.”

Oh. That did change things. It might even be enough of a concession that Tran would accept it. “You should write it,” Randi said weakly. “But I’ll review it.” Vanyel was better with words than he was; he could admit that to himself. “One concern I still have. Even if you’re not saying anything, Leareth is very perceptive. What if he picks something up from your body language?”

“Oh, I’m sure he will.” Vanyel’s lips twisted into a bitter-edged smile. “Hopefully all he’ll be able to tell is that I’m scared witless, which is honestly quite a reasonable response.” A shrug. “He’ll have guessed that I told you something, given that you’re suddenly ramming through an annexation of the north. I’ll do my best not to give away anything more. I do have _some _control of my face, you know.”

‘Some’ was an understatement; Vanyel could keep his feelings to himself more than anyone Randi had ever known. But not necessarily enough to fool a man with a thousand years of practice; that was the trouble.

“Fine,” he heard himself say. “I’ll think about it, and I do want to talk to Tran. But you make a good point.”

He would have to think further on whether Vanyel asking Leareth to leave Valdemar alone until he made a decision gave anything away – did it make them look weaker? Would Leareth take the hint that they weren’t ready, and attack while Vanyel was away? Hells, would he somehow guess that Vanyel was leaving on a mission to learn more?

Questions he might not be able to answer even in theory, but he would try.

* * *

_Icy wind flattened his cloak to his body. Vanyel stood at the mouth of a frozen pass. _

_He remembered sending Tylendel away, remembered his white, worried face turned back, receding into the distance as Yfandes ran…_

(Vanyel didn’t particularly want to be where he was, but he had been expecting it, and rehearsing.)

_“Herald Vanyel.” Leareth nodded deeply, almost a bow. He made no attempt to approach. _

_“Leareth.” _

_Leareth’s eyes rested on him, his face like still water. “It has been some time.” _

_“I apologize for that,” Vanyel said, briefly bowing his head. “There are some things I should say to you. I expect to have a lot of questions about your plan, at some point, but I wanted to warn you that I need more time to think it over first.” _

(He would rather have asked some of those questions now, but every word he said was another place he could be leaking information. Randi had ordered him to keep it as short as possible.)

_Leareth smiled thinly. “Oh. You have found a way to temporarily halt our dreams.” _

(It wasn’t strictly something Leareth should have been able to guess, from the limited information he had – unless he had been having the dream without Vanyel in it, of course – but Vanyel had expected him to figure it out. It was exactly the sort of impossible inference Leareth was so good at making.)

_Vanyel tried to give no sign of acknowledgement, and went on as though he hadn’t heard. “I don’t want to come to any hasty conclusions.” He dipped his chin forward, hair slipping across one eye. “I’m sure you understand.” _

_“I do.” Was that a hint of sympathy in Leareth’s black eyes? _

_Vanyel took a deep breath. “Leareth. I do respect you, and what you’re trying to do in the abstract. Even if the details still seem horrifying to me. I haven’t given up hope that we can be allies, and so I ask that you leave Valdemar alone while I think this over.” _

_Silence. _

_“I see,” Leareth said finally. “Herald Vanyel, you are no fool. You will understand that I cannot give you all the time you may wish for.” He was still for a long moment. “One year.” _

(It was generous. Though by the ever-so-slight settling of his shoulders, the faintest downturn of his lips, it was apparent that Leareth thought it was stingy. Maybe a year would seem short, to someone who had spent millennia preparing. A year was far more than Vanyel had been counting on – surely it wouldn’t take anywhere near that long to travel to the Dhorisha Plains and back.)

_“It will do,” Vanyel said, trying to seem neither pleased nor disappointed. _

_“Then I will give you my word.” Leareth, across the expanse of ice, held out his hand. “I will make no promises as to my preparations, but I swear to you, by the light of every star in the sky, that I will do nothing that crosses your Kingdom’s borders, until one year has passed from this date.” A pause, the slightest twitch of an eyebrow. “For this purpose, I will consider your borders to begin at the Forest of Wendwinter.” _

(Confirmation that he knew about the annexation, which was expected – but it was interesting that he had decided to let Vanyel know he knew.)

_Vanyel nodded. “I hear your oath.” He closed his eyes for a moment. “And I swear to you, Leareth, on my honour as a Herald, that I will think on this with as open a mind as I can.” _

(It wasn’t an unreasonable oath to make, he thought; it was only what he would have done anyway. And it might seem a sort of peace offering. Randi had raised an eyebrow, but he hadn’t crossed that particular line off the draft.)

_Leareth inclined his head, the slightest of nods. “I understand.” A quiet breath. “I respect that you do not wish to speak further at this time. It is perhaps a reasonable choice – you know that I am more experienced in the art of argument and persuasion, and given that, it is perhaps correct on your part to hold back from engaging until you have reasoned it through on your own.” A long pause. “Until we meet again, Herald Vanyel.” _

_And Leareth turned his back, dark cloak billowing in the wind, and waited in silence for the dream to end. _


	6. Chapter Six

“I can’t believe I’m doing this again.” Vanyel stood with his hand on Yfandes’ mane, staring balefully at the open doors of the Heralds’ Temple to Kernos. “Voluntarily.”

“It’s half the distance to Sunhame,” Savil pointed out. “Not even three hundred miles.”

“Yes, but the threshold is more than twice the size.” Vanyel checked his saddlebags a final time, made sure his lute in its case was well fastened to Yfandes’ back, then craned over his shoulder, glancing around for Dara. Still no sign of her.

“It’ll save you a week’s journey at least,” Savil said, coaxingly. “And the inn in Bakerston has a lovely bathhouse.”

“Does it? Never stayed there.” He had slept on the floor of the guard-post a couple of times, during the war, and in the nearest Waystation on earlier circuits. “Dara will be pleased.”

“Dara isn’t half the sybarite you are,” Savil teased.

Vanyel’s attention was already wandering, back to the bronze doors. _I wonder, do they have to be open? _

Surely not. It was the usual practice to raise a Gate starting from an open door, he had never tried to do it otherwise, but Savil had Gated from outside Haven to the Heralds’ temple without any warning more than once – he’d never thought to ask if the doors had been open at the time, but it would have had to be by sheer coincidence, they were usually kept closed, and Savil hadn’t been worried about the Gate-spell failing for that reason.

Focus.

_I don’t want to do this. _He could feel his inner tension rising; his stomach churned, and he was grateful he had eaten lightly at breakfast, it wouldn’t exactly be a good omen to start off their journey with him vomiting on his own boots.

…It was a self-fulfilling prediction. He was afraid that the Gate would be agony, so he tensed up, and that was exactly the problem. Damn it. _Pull yourself together, Herald. _He had done this before. All he needed to do was relax.

It had been a lot easier with Jisa forcing that – gods, she was strong, and afterwards it had been a little disconcerting, no one had ever overridden his responses like that before. At the time, he hadn’t been capable of feeling anything but utterly peaceful.

Jisa would have been delighted to do it again, he knew, but it was a more useful test to try the second time without her – and while he still had the opportunity to rest somewhere safe afterward, within the borders of Valdemar. If he needed to Gate for any reason on this journey, he wouldn’t have Jisa, nor anyone who knew how to Heal his channels.

He had spent a candlemark the night before building and taking down tiny Gates, each time moving the destination-terminus further out – starting with both in the same room, ending up with one of them in the stables with Yfandes. That much had gone smoothly.

_This is different. I can’t do it. _

He desperately wished that he could have used any other doorway. This spot was exactly where he had watched, from his knees, as ‘Lendel turned away on the other side of the Gate and raised his hands one final time…

_Don’t push it away. _Sit with the grief for a moment, and let it pass.

“Vanyel?”

The voice belonged to Dara, and he glanced up, his heart suddenly hammering.

“Am I late?” she said, frowning. “I thought we said–”

“You’re not late.” He smiled reassuringly. “I just came early to prepare.” It was about a candlemark to noon. They would have the whole afternoon in Bakerston; Vanyel would likely spend it resting, while Dara went around gathering as much information as she could on conditions in Rethwellan. They would plan their route, and leave the next morning.

For the first time since Sunhame, he would be outside Valdemar. Outside the Web.

Rolan cantered up behind Dara. Even in his unadorned travel-saddle, laden with saddlebags, he managed to look majestic. Next to him, Vanyel could feel Yfandes tensing up. She wasn’t at all pleased by the prospect of a long, long journey accompanied by Rolan, whom she had confessed was still rather annoyed with her.

_:I know, love: _He patted her neck.

_:It’s going to be all right: _He felt her trying to gather herself, like someone straightening their shoulders and raising their chin defiantly. _:Melody thinks it’s good, even, for you to have lots of time to talk to him: _he reminded her._ :Might clear the air: _

Not that she was looking forward to it.

“I’m waiting for Shavri,” Dara was saying out loud. “She was going to bring Need over.”

Vanyel remembered his conversation with her last night. _It’s silly, _she had said, rolling her eyes. _I half want to change my mind and say I’m keeping her. _Vanyel had asked if Need was being possessive, resisting the idea of parting ways with her for a time, and Shavri had said no – if anything, the sword was excited by the prospect of a journey. _If anyone’s getting possessive, it’s me_, the Healer had confessed. _Guess I got used to being invincible. _

But, second thoughts aside, she hadn’t gone back on her offer.

Vanyel felt the brush of Savil’s mind, and parted his shields for her.

_:I’m going to miss you, ke’chara: _she sent.

_:I’ll miss you as well, aunt: _He lifted his head. _:You’d better take care of yourself: _

_:Hey. I’m supposed to be the one saying that to you: _She held out her arms. _:Let’s get the goodbyes out of the way: _

He tucked his head under her chin, sighing. _:I wish I didn’t have to leave: _

_:I know. You’ll do fine, ke’chara: _She stroked his hair. _:And your stick-in-the-mud old aunt is going to do some hard thinking while you’re away: _

He didn’t respond, only clung to the link.

_:Vanyel?: _

The mindvoice belonged to Shavri. Vanyel let go of Savil, with reluctance, and turned.

“Dara.” The Healer nodded stiffly to the girl. “Remember, I’m giving her to you because I trust you.” She patted the hilt of the sword, belted to her side, still incongruous with her Healer’s robes. “I gave her a good talking-to, but she will push you. Don’t let her shove her around. She needs to know you’re the one in control.” 

There were shadows under Shavri’s eyes, but there was a strange brightness to her, hard and blazing, like steel reflecting sunlight. _She was out all night with Need again_. Shavri had never actually said to him that she did that, but he could always tell.

_She’s going to regret it once she hands Need over. _Shavri had admitted to using Need for something like extra energy. Vanyel still wasn’t sure how the sword did it, even with magic.

Slowly, with obvious unwillingness, Shavri unbelted the scabbard. She held the sword flat across her hands for a moment, eyes closed – and then held out her arms.

Dara, very solemnly, reached out and took the blade.

Vanyel reached out to steady Shavri’s elbow as she sagged. She caught his eye, grimacing. _:I know. I was being an idiot. Randi’s going to tell me off and I’ll deserve it:_

She didn’t say, he noted, that she regretted it.

“Dara, you make us all proud out there,” Shavri said.

Dara ducked her head. “I’ll try.”

“And you be careful, Vanyel.” Shavri’s eyes creased at the corners – and, as though for the first time, Vanyel noticed the crow’s-feet there, and the lines on either side of her mouth. The wiry grey hairs combed into her dark curls. Shavri was only thirty, younger than Vanyel, but on days like today she seemed a decade older.

_:I’ll miss you: _he sent. _:Take care of yourself. And Randi: _

_:I’ll try: _She held out her arms. _:Don’t do anything stupid and reckless: _

_:I’ve grown out of that: _He hugged her hard. _:Tell Randi goodbye for me: _He had already said his farewells the night before, but it hadn’t felt like enough.

_:It never does: _Shavri must have been close enough in the link to catch that thought. _:We’ll still be here when you come home, Van: _

Probably. Unless Randi’s illness progressed faster than expected. _Savil knows the communication spell, _he reminded himself. Even across half the world, she ought to be able to reach him in an emergency, and he knew he could Gate five hundred miles now. At worst he would need to take it in two segments, using a terminus in Sunhame. _I’ll be there with you if he dies. _Not a promise he wanted to make out loud, because he wasn’t sure he could keep it, but all the same.

“Time to go,” Savil said.

Shavri released him, but held the mind-link. _:I’m here if you need energy, Van: _

_:I shouldn’t. It’s not far: _He sent a wordless wash of appreciation anyway – and then noticed the surprise, that he thought three hundred miles ‘wasn’t far.’

Take a deep breath. _Center and ground. _He was out of excuses to delay.

_:You can do this: _Yfandes sent.

He raised his hands.

* * *

“Herald Kilchas?” Jisa called up into the darkness.

“…Jisa? Is that you?” He sounded distracted.

“It’s me. Can I come up?” She stood at the base of the astronomy-tower, shouted up the narrow flight of stairs.

“If you like. I’m a little busy.” 

Jisa liked Kilchas. The old man could be gruff; Mama liked to say he never bothered much with tact; but he was friendly enough to her, and she knew it wasn’t pretend friendliness. Kilchas was the sort of person who was usually caught up in his own head, and tonight, that was what she wanted. Not someone who would pay too much attention to her and try to make her feel better.

“I just want to watch!” she called out, starting to climb. “I won’t bother you.”

The stairs went up and up, until she reached the top of the tower. It was mostly flat, with a knee-high parapet all around the edges; to one side, there was a sort of little hut with a glass roof. Kilchas had built it for watching the sky in winter, when it was too cold to stand around on a roof for candlemarks.

Mama said he hadn’t asked the Palace workmen to build it; he had made it with his own hands and magic, so it was just how he wanted it.

He wasn’t in there now; it was a clear night and the air was cool, but not cold. The moon was three-quarters full, and bright. The sky wasn’t actually closer, Jisa knew the stars were very far away and the tower wasn’t tall enough to make any difference, but it felt closer.

Kilchas stood by his big telescope, adjusting the angle. “Heya, pet. Want to see something incredible?”

Pride in his voice. It was funny, how Kilchas was proud of the _sky_, which didn’t belong to anybody. He loved to show it off to anyone who would appreciate it, like a master artist unveiling a fine painting.

“Yes please,” Jisa said politely, tucking her lighter spring cloak around her – it was clear out, but not still, there was a bit of wind.

“Be careful,” Kilchas warned. “Don’t go too close to the edge.”

Jisa joined him beside the telescope. “What am I looking at?”

Kilchas moved aside, and gently took her shoulders, guiding her to stand in front of the eyepiece. “It’s called the Dragon’s Eye. It’s a nebula.”

Jisa pressed her eye to the little round hole. “What’s a nebula?”

“No one really knows.” Kilchas’ voice was distant, awed. “It’s very far away. The ancients thought perhaps they were worlds like ours, once, that were destroyed. Shattered into the void, until there was only dust left.”

“Worlds?” Something quivered in her stomach. “Are there other worlds?”

“Who knows? Some scholars think there could be.”

“Are there people there?”

He ruffled her hair. “…Now that’s something I doubt we can ever know, child.”

She shivered. “What could destroy a whole world?”

“The Mage Wars might have destroyed ours,” Kilchas murmured. “We know the Cataclysm came close. If there was ever another war like that, we might not be so lucky.” He paused. “A god could destroy the world with a wave of their hand, if they wanted to.”

Jisa didn’t answer. She blinked, feeling her eyelashes stick against the little circle of glass, her other eye clenched shut. “It looks sort of like a cloud,” she said.

“Yes, that’s it exactly.” Kilchas’ voice was faster, excitement and joy in it.

“It’s pretty.” Jisa stared until her eye was watering – and not just from the night air. The Mage Wars could have destroyed the world. She had never thought about that, and it was frightening.

“Now, don’t hog it,” Kilchas said finally, taking her shoulders and gently moving her aside. “We’ll take turns.”

“Sorry.” She stepped back, wiping her eyes on her cloak, and then tilted her head back. Without the telescope, she couldn’t see the little cloud at all.

There was so much sky. It seemed to go on forever and ever. There was something comforting in it.

Somewhere, too far away to reach with Mindspeech, Uncle Van was looking at the same sky.

_Be careful_, she thought. _Come home safe. _

“Kilchas?” she said, a while later.

“Yes, pet?”

“You like Sandra, don’t you?”

Kilchas had gone still, his eyes fixed on her, beady and piercing, reminding her of Starwind’s bondbird. He licked his lips. “What do you mean?”

“I mean, you fancy her.” Maybe that was clearer. Jisa didn’t understand why grownups were so obtuse about this sort of thing. “It makes sense. She’s a very impressive person.”

Kilchas’ gaze softened. “She is.”

“But you assume she doesn’t like you back the same way?” Jisa guessed.

The older Herald-Mage shook his head. “She’s wrapped up in her work, Sandra is. I’d never take her away from that. Not to mention, I can’t think what she’d see in an old man like me.”

_Why are they so hopeless? _Jisa tried not to roll her eyes. “Kilchas, I think Sandra does like you.” She knew it, almost with certainty. She hadn’t actually used her Receptive Empathy or Thoughtsensing to read the other Herald –even though there was no way Melody would find out, it was still wrong – but she was good at reading other signs as well.

Kilchas looked blankly at her. “She would have said something. Sandra isn’t shy.”

How could they have worked together for so many years, and still not understand each other? “Maybe not usually,” Jisa admitted. “I think she’s insecure about men, though. Maybe she doesn’t think she’s pretty.” She had asked around, discreetly, and Sandra hadn’t had many liaisons with the other Heralds – but she definitely preferred men to women, which Jisa hadn’t been sure of at first.

“Guess she isn’t pretty, exactly. Just stunning.” Kilchas was smiling vaguely at the horizon, now. “Like the stars. Something you never forget.” Then he grimaced. “Still stands. What would she see in a crippled old man like me? She’s half my age!”

Sandra was thirty and Kilchas was fifty-something, which didn’t seem too unreasonable to Jisa. “You’re not crippled. You can come up the stairs all by yourself.” Jisa knew that had only been true for about a year. Kilchas walked with a limp even now, and it made her sad, that he had been injured so badly in the war and his body would never be completely right again.

“True. Gemma and Andrel won’t give up on me.” Kilchas ran a hand over his stringy grey hair. “Still, I never was much to look at, even before I was hurt.”

They did make a funny sight, the two of them together – Sandra, tall and regal like a stalking marsh-heron, and Kilchas, shorter and shuffling with a face like a mischievous wood-sprite out of tales.

“I wouldn’t figure that’s what Sandra cares about,” Jisa said solemnly. “What things look like. She wants to understand what they’re made of and why. And she thinks you’re interesting.” She paused. “Have you ever invited her up here to look at the stars with you?”

“No.”

Jisa grinned at him. “I think you should. And you should tell her what the scholars wrote about it, that maybe there are other worlds. I think she would like that.”

“Maybe she would at that.” Kilchas was smiling slightly now, his eyes unfocused. “Maybe she would.”

* * *

Dara cautiously unlocked the door, trying to be quiet, but the hinges hadn’t been oiled in a long time, and they screeched.

“Whozat?” a sleep-blurred voice mumbled.

“Sorry!” she hissed. “It’s just me. Dara.” She closed the door behind her, very slowly, which unfortunately didn’t make it any quieter. “You can go back to sleep. I didn’t mean to wake you.”

“M’awake now.” Vanyel was already sitting up in the narrow bed, rubbing his eyes. He yawned. “What time is it?”

“Candlemark after sunset.” It was quite dark in the room, with only the moonlight slanting in through the open curtains, mixing with the red glow of the dying fire. Dara set down her saddlebags by the other bed, retrieved a log from the box laid out for them, and tossed it onto the coals, watching as it smouldered slowly without catching.

–Suddenly, it burst into flames, a second before all the candles in the sconces flared to life. Dara spun over her shoulder so fast her neck cracked, just in time to see Vanyel lowering his hand.

“Show-off,” she said, waiting for her heart rate to slow.

“Sorry. I’ll warn you next time.” Vanyel swung his legs over the side of the bed, and then bent over his knees, cupping his hands to his face.

“You all right?” Dara straightened up.

“Just a bit dizzy. I should eat something.”

“Supper’s coming. I asked the innkeeper to have someone bring it upstairs.” Dara would have liked to eat in the big taproom, she thought – a big group of the Guard seemed to be enjoying a night off there, and some of them were very attractive, not that she was going to do anything but it was nice to look at them. Vanyel found people tiring, though, and she had guessed he would prefer quiet and privacy.

“Do you have a headache?” she said. “I bought some of that willowbark tincture, I could mix it in wine for you.”

“It’s not too bad.” He sat up straighter, brushing back his hair. “Remarkably. I wouldn’t ever have thought I could Gate without it hurting for days.” A grimace. “It’s a little embarrassing, really. I never thought to work on it earlier.”

“Better late than never.” Dara sat down on her cot. “I checked on your ‘Fandes, by the way. She’s comfortable and the stablehands are spoiling her.”

“Thank you.” Vanyel started to stand, and then seemed to think better of it. “Dara, could you get my waterskin from over there?”

“Of course.” She jumped up. “Oh, by the way. I spoke to the captain of the Guard at the post out here, and several merchants. The Comb is clear of snow, it was an early spring this year, so we shouldn’t have any difficulty. I was thinking we aim to reach Bell’s Valley tomorrow, and bring provisions in case we can’t make it over the mountains in one day and have to camp.”

“Sounds fine.” Vanyel yawned again.

It wasn’t the easiest journey they could have chosen; the Comb was well known for being treacherous. In theory they could have gone via Menmellith, taking a different mountain pass, but that would have been a less direct route, requiring them to travel from Chapel Hill, the closest Gate-terminus Vanyel could use. The border with Menmellith was neutral, at least on paper, but it was a strange little kingdom – formerly a part of Karse, in some time half lost to history, it was isolationist as any nation squeezed between three much larger countries could be. Rethwellan was much less politically fraught, and on Companion-back the pass ought not to present any real difficulty.

“We don’t need to set out too early tomorrow,” Dara offered. “Rolan thinks we can reach Bell’s Valley in eight candlemarks.”

“Which I’m guessing is a subtle way of informing me I should sleep in,” Vanyel said dryly.

“…Maybe.”

“I don’t mind.” He smiled, eyes glinting in the candlelight. “I know Melody talked to you, asked you to look out for me. It’s fine. Really. I appreciate it.” One should rose and fell, ruefully. “Though I might snap at you sometimes, if you’re being a mother-hen.”

“I’ll try to avoid that.” Dara felt something in her relax. Melody had insisted she had Vanyel’s permission, but Dara still hadn’t been sure how he would feel about it. It was a relief to have it in the open between them; she hadn’t wanted to be the one who brought it up first.

The Mindhealer had coached her for a whole candlemark on what to be careful of, what to say to be helpful rather than making it worse – and how to recognize an emergency and get more help. _I really hope you don’t have to urgently find a Mindhealer in the middle of the Dhorisha Plains, _she had said, _so let’s hope for the best, but you should be prepared for the worst. _

That was a mantra Dara could get behind.

It was hard to believe that two days from now, they would be outside Valdemar. The first time in her life she would be leaving her native kingdom behind, and for who knew how long. Maybe she should have been scared, but she wasn’t. A little nervous, maybe, more about potentially awkwardness like getting lost than about real danger.

Vanyel was with her. She was probably safer than half the people in Valdemar right now.

It was interesting – there had been so many doubts about Vanyel after it all came out, maybe she should have felt uncomfortable about being alone with him, but she didn’t at all. Maybe because Rolan didn’t, but she thought it wasn’t just that.

_:I do trust Herald Vanyel: _Rolan sent; there was something like amusement in his mindvoice, and something else, more alien. _:With your safety, that is. He may be compromised, but if so, it is in a very subtle way. He is still a Herald, and he would never let harm come to you: _

That was true. Trust was complicated, Dara mused. It seemed weird, to trust Vanyel with looking after her but not with coming to strategy-meetings, and yet maybe it made sense.

_:I do worry he might try to persuade you of his conclusions: _Rolan sent. _:Yet I doubt he would succeed. Despite your youth, you are not easy to sway: _

That was a real compliment, coming from Rolan. Smiling to herself, she handed Vanyel his waterskin and then reached to unbuckle her sword-belt. _:Need, did you hear that? We’re leaving Valdemar. The vrondi will stop bothering you soon: _

_:…?: _A sleepy, mostly incomprehensible mumble, almost but not quite Mindspeech. It felt different from Mindtouching another human.

_:Soon: _she promised, and set the sword down on the bed. _:In the meantime, you just tell me if there are any women in trouble in Bakerston: _

Maybe there would even be an adventure tonight.

* * *

“Good morning, Herald Katha,” Stef said politely. “I brought you some tea.”

The sun was barely peeking over the horizon, but she raised her head from her desk and smiled brightly at him. “You’re a dear. Come set that over here. Feeling rested, I hope?”

“Yes.” It had all come to a head after the spring festival, when he had almost fainted in front of the King. Breda had apparently stormed right into the office of the King’s Own Herald and _demanded _that they give her best student enough time to do any of his homework.

The note from Herald Tantras, acting King’s Own, had arrived that afternoon, while Stef was still lazing about in bed – he had been feeling a lot better by then, but Andrel had ordered him to rest, and it was quite nice having Medren bringing him meals from the dining-hall and fussing over him. Not that Stef would have admitted that out loud.

He’d had three whole days off, and he had spent an embarrassing amount of it sleeping. The King had changed his ongoing lesson with Katha to three times a week instead of every day, which meant he could sleep in on the alternate days.

And Breda had come in and sat at the foot of his bed, very serious, as she explained that she was cutting his class-load. He would have most afternoons off, and she would give him extra days to finish homework if he was unexpectedly called to sing for the King. _I wouldn’t do it for anyone but you, Stef_, she had said, before adding that she was very disappointed in his recent assignments and performances, and expected better now.

She had tried to seem disapproving, but he knew she was proud.

Healer Shavri had visited as well, and apologized for not realizing how worn down he was. _We have no choice but to ask a great deal of you, _she had said. _I just want you to know how much this means to us. _

That had left him glowing all day. All in all, Stef was feeling _much _better about his prospects. He was earning the King’s favour, and he was learning how to be a real spy – and he was still in Breda’s good graces at Bardic. With all of that, he could find himself a place.

As long as he was very careful, and didn’t hurt his hands or his voice. No one wanted a Bard who couldn’t make music anymore.

As long as he didn’t make trouble. No one wanted a spy who caused scandals; that was the first thing Katha had told him. _Your ability to pass unnoticed is your greatest resource_, she had said, _and you need to shepherd it very carefully. _

Stef was kicking himself for not having realized that before. It should have been obvious, and he had almost squandered it by accident.

“Sit down,” Katha said. “I thought, since you’ve been so attentive on the theory, we might do something more on the practical side today.”

Stef nodded, seriously, hiding the grin that tried to slip out. _Finally. _

He thought he was starting to get on Katha’s good side as well. At first she had been irritated to have a new tag-along youngster getting in her way, though she had tried to hide it and treated him civilly enough. With enough application of tea and flattery, she was warming to him, and he hoped he was impressing her as well.

“You’re not a Mindspeaker,” she said simply. “Nor a Herald. This does limit your options. However. I hear that you’ve already been using your Gift in rather creative ways.”

Stef tried not to stiffen. How much did she know?

She smiled. “Randi tells me you’re able to shield yourself from a Thoughtsenser, using Bardic Gift alone. I would be very curious to see how.”

Well, she seemed amused and pleased rather than angry with him. “All right.” Could he do it again? He wasn’t even sure what he had done the first time.

Close his eyes, take a deep breath. He hummed, a single low note, barely audible, and pushed. _Nothing to see. Nothing of interest. Move along, no need to pay attention here… _

“Oh. I see. You can stop now.” Katha waited until Stef had opened his eyes and focused on her face. “That’s rather interesting. Not a shield at all. I think you’re projecting a sort of Empathic effect, except that it’s via your Bardic Gift, which most people can’t shield against. Fascinating.” Her eyes rested on him, speculative. “It’s not going to work against someone who’s _already _noticed you, I’m afraid – I imagine it’ll only work if no one is expecting you to be there. But it’s very promising, and not just for hiding from Thoughtsensers. I wonder what else you can project?”

“What sort of thing are you thinking?”

Katha lifted the teacup to her lips, her eyes drifting to the papers pinned to her wall. “Well, you could make someone think you were supposed to be there. A trusted household servant, that they’ve definitely seen before but can’t quite place, but certainly nothing to worry about. Or a Palace craftsman, who has every right to be poking around someone’s chambers repairing ornaments. Or a lieutenant of the Guard.” She propped her chin on her folded fist, gazing at him. “A great deal of this sort of work is misdirection, you know. Give the right impression, so that people see what they’re expecting. Servant livery or a Guard-uniform goes a long way, speaking and moving the right way goes further – and you could do even better with that Gift of yours.”

“Oh.” He was an idiot. Why hadn’t he ever thought to play with his Gift in that way?

“Stefen.” Katha’s voice was suddenly serious. “Look at me. If I’m going to teach you this, you need to promise me something.”

“What?” He met her eyes steadily. _Never show weakness. _

“That you’ll never, ever misuse it.” Her eyes, usually sparkling with a hint of mischief, were cold and hard. “I would be teaching you how to deceive others. I need you to take it very, very seriously, and the only time you will use it will be at the King’s orders.”

He blinked. “But what if I don’t–”

She set the teacup down, and steepled her fingers together. “You’re thinking, what if you have a very clever idea, and if you went back to obtain permission from Randi, you would lose your chance?”

…He nodded, slowly.

“I had the same worry, once. It is a conundrum.” The line of her mouth firmed. “Stefen, if you do well, you will have the King’s trust, and he might give you standing orders, on where you can intervene using your best judgement. I have that permission from him, and several of my agents do – but not all. It’s something that you need to earn, and you _won’t _earn it if you don’t show your trustworthiness first. Which means following orders.”

Stef nodded, slowly. He could understand that. King Randale didn’t have much reason to think he was trustworthy yet. Well-intentioned and dedicated, maybe – Randale had _better _think that, after all the candlemarks he had spent using his Gift to help the King with nothing expected in return – but maybe he did need to prove his good judgement.

_Maybe I need to work on my good judgement_. He had made mistakes in the past, after all. Getting himself tossed in the river that one time had been mostly his own fault.

“I understand,” he said. “Katha, I give you my word that if you teach me, I won’t abuse it.”

“Good lad.” She patted his shoulder, smiling again. “Hmm. I think we’ll start out having you practice on me, and once you’re ready we’ll run some tests. Safe situations at first. But let’s start simple.” She paused, sipping her tea again while she thought. “All right. Stef, I’m a shopkeeper. Convince me that you’re a customer I’ve definitely seen before, who always pays on time.”

…How was he even supposed to start, with that? _I have no idea._

Katha just waited, offering no advice.

He closed his eyes. _I can do this. _A shopkeeper – he didn’t know many shopkeepers, but he could imagine old Tatar and his pawn-shop. Not many customers back in Three Rivers could afford to pay their bills reliably, but if he were one of them…

* * *

Even dipping close to the horizon, the sun was painfully bright, shining like molten gold on the white-peaked mountains, as they crested the slope and slowed to a halt.

_:I think I need another rest: _Vanyel managed, bending over his knees and wheezing. Spots danced in his vision as he blinked, eyes stinging from the sweat dripping down his brow.

He and Dara had dismounted candlemarks ago, and picked their way alongside the Companions, up and up, following the winding trail carved into the sheer rock-face. It was a good thing the ice and snow was mostly gone at these heights; he couldn’t imagine navigating with that additional hazard.

He couldn’t understand why he was so exhausted. Towards the end, every step had felt like wading through molasses, and he couldn’t catch his breath. There was a stabbing pain in his side.

_:It’s because we’re so high, Chosen: _Yfandes sent, along with a wash of love and concern. _:The air is thinner:_

_:You don’t seem to be having any trouble: _Vanyel had a headache, too – a dull throbbing pressure that seemed to be everywhere in his head, it felt different from a reaction-headache or tension headache.

_:I keep telling you to eat something: _Yfandes sent. _:Van, sit down. You should have told me earlier you needed to stop: _

_:Wanted to get it over with: _For most of the afternoon, they had been stopping briefly every half-candlemark or so, to catch their breath and drink from their waterskins – the air was very dry, and even though it was cold, Vanyel had stripped off his tunic ages ago and was still drenched in sweat, now chilling against his skin.

He felt her damp nose nudge at his face. _:Why are all men like this?:_

_:Well, now I get a nice long rest while Dara catches up: _She and Rolan were still a hundred metres further down. They had argued about whether to stick close to each other, in case one of them fell, and eventually decided it wasn’t worth the risk of knocking each other down the slope.

_:Drink some water, love: _Yfandes was still snuffling at his hair. _:Or at least help me get some. I’m parched: _

He straightened up, wincing, and retrieved the collapsible bucket from the top of his saddlebags, carefully filling it from the larger waterskin and setting it down on a flat spot. They had known there wouldn’t be any standing water for this part of the journey, and packed extra.

He took a few sips, until his belly started to cramp, then spotted a rock and sat down, putting his head between his knees._ I feel so out of shape. _

_:You’ll feel better in a minute: _Yfandes sent.

_:Gods, I’m beat: _Vanyel looked up in time to see Dara reaching the top of the hill, gripping the pommel of Rolan’s saddle. _:That was worse than sparring with Kayla: _She was breathing too hard to speak as well.

_:It’s all downhill from here: _Vanyel sat up, rubbing his head.

_:You’ve got a headache too? Rolan says it’s because the air is thin: _Dara made a face. _:He says we shouldn’t camp up here, so we’d better keep going if we want to find a good spot before dark: _

Damned youngsters, Vanyel thought irritably. Dara was flushed and sweaty, but she was practically bouncing on her heels. _:I’m not quite ready: _he admitted. _:Need a few minutes: _She had a point about the light, though; sunset wasn’t far away, and the last thing he wanted to do was navigate that slope of scree and bare rock in the dark.

_:Look. Isn’t it incredible?: _Dara was shading her eyes with one hand, pointing down the mountain. _:You can see everything!: _

It was quite spectacular. Almost worth the effort of the climb.

_:It’s beautiful: _Yfandes agreed. _:I wonder if that’s the river that runs through Petras?: _

_:Maybe: _In the slanting sun, it was a narrow winding ribbon of light. Petras, the capital city of Rethwellan, was still much too far away to be visible, nearly two hundred miles. If they were lucky, in another day they would reach the foothills of the Comb, and a day or two after that they would hit the main trade road. From there on, the journey would be much easier.

But not short. They were probably still a week from Petras, at which point they would have to delay at least a few days to pay their diplomatic respects and discuss passage through Jkatha. Vanyel still didn’t have a good cover story for that, though he had a few blank pages of letterhead pre-stamped with the King’s seal, waiting to be filled out. Randi had winked and told him to think of something.

From there, it was likely _still _another week to reach the southern border of Rethwellan, assuming they were allowed to cross without difficulty. And then another week, maybe two if the weather didn’t cooperate, to reach the borders of the Dhorisha plains. They would be gone a month before they even reached their destination.

It loomed ahead of him, daunting.

_:One day at a time: _Yfandes reminded him. _:We’ll get there: _

Dara was a pleasant enough travel-companion. She could more than hold up her side of a conversation, when he wanted to talk, and she was happy with silence when he didn’t. She was good with people, too – she had done all of the negotiating with innkeepers, and with various vendors in the Bell’s Valley market for travel provisions, before he could even ask.

_:She’s a sensible girl: _Yfandes agreed. _:I’m glad she’s with us: _

Even if she wasn’t glad about Dara’s Companion – but, so far, there hadn’t been too much conflict between Yfandes and Rolan. Maybe he had forgiven her by now.

There was one mercy, Vanyel thought. Camping was an excuse to sleep curled up against Yfandes, sharing warmth – and, exhausted as he was, maybe he would be able to sleep without nightmares tonight.

* * *

“Copper for your thoughts?” Savil said.

Randi turned his head, from where he had been staring vaguely at the window, propped up on a stack of pillows against the headboard of his bed. “Sorry! I was woolgathering.”

Or starting to nod off, Savil suspected; it was late in the evening, and the drugs were clearly starting to hit him. Randi couldn’t focus well for long without either strong painkillers or Trainee Stefen, and Stefen couldn’t attend to him every minute of every day.

The King ran a hand over his thinning hair. “Sorry. What do we still need to cover?”

“Not too much. I’ll try to finish up so you can get some rest.” Savil was trying to stifle her own yawn, now. “I think we’ve discussed everything related to the treaty. There was one thing…” She had been trying to figure out how to bring it up for days. “Randi, I want to talk about what we’re telling the Senior Circle. With regards to Leareth.”

“What about it?”

She took a deep breath. “I’m not sure, but something’s bothering me. We _aren’t _saying everything, and…I guess I don’t know how I feel about that.”

“Oh. You’re talking about what Joshel brought up in the meeting this morning?”

“That’s part of it.” Savil stroked the tip of her nose, searching for words. “We haven’t lied to them, or actively hidden anything,” aside from Yfandes’ five-day excursion, “but we’ve really given them the basics. What Leareth is claiming he’s doing, and the fact that we could potentially negotiate with him and avoid war.” Though she wasn’t sure that was accurate. Leareth had expressed interest in an alliance with Vanyel. It was less clear if he would be willing to sign a treaty with King Randale of Valdemar; it wasn’t totally clear, but his offer might have been for Vanyel to go north and join him. “I’m worried that the basics are misleading, and that anyone who just has that picture is going be proposing solutions that are off the mark.”

“I can see that. Joshel is clearly thinking of him as some sort of ordinary warlord, one we could placate with a neutral trade-agreement and some other concessions. I mean, I did ask people to share all their ideas even if they were bad, but still.”

Savil nodded. “I don’t think he even believes the part about the ten million people or fighting the gods, not deep down – he must think it’s just grandstanding. Can’t blame him. He doesn’t have the context for it to make sense_, _that we think Leareth is aiming for this in dead earnest, we think he can probably succeed at the first part – and we’re still trying to keep our options open for an alliance, rather than trying to take him out as fast as we can. You and I both know that’s because we’re not sure we can win, in a direct war. I can understand why you haven’t wanted to emphasize that, it’s terrifying, just – I’m worried the picture doesn’t make sense to the Joshel without his having all the pieces.”

“I did notice.” Randi pinched the bridge of his nose. “Keiran as well, I don’t think she really understands how competent he is. There’s no way we can catch him out with standard tactics and a bit of misdirection.”

Tantras had been the one to point that out, in the meeting itself, and Keiran had just tossed her head as though shaking off an irritating fly. _She doesn’t really believe it either. _

“The problem is that we gave them our initial thoughts,” Savil tried again, “but not all the reasons behind it. At least, not the real reasons. We brought them on board at all because we need their planning and judgement, because we can’t carry this on our own – but I’m worried we’re not giving them the information they need for good judgement. A few of Kilchas’ ideas have been rather odd as well.”

“Like the one about asking Iftel to act as a neutral third party and host peace talks?” Randi shook his head. “I’m pretty sure he was joking.”

Savil had hoped so as well; it was just like Kilchas to pull something like that, even when it was clearly inappropriate, but it was better than the alternative where he was serious. Setting aside that there was no way whatever was in charge of Iftel would let Leareth in, they didn’t allow Heralds into the kingdom either, and that was enforced by an implacable shield-wall, that couldn’t be tricked or negotiated with. Even Elspeth the Peacemaker had never visited her husband in his homeland, after the alliance-marriage.

…Which should have caused a lot more talk than it had, really. _Why is no one curious about Iftel? _An echo of Vanyel’s voice in her head. Questions they had forgotten to ask…

Worry about it later; it was a digression. “I understand the reasons why we’re not telling them everything,” she said finally, suddenly weary. “It would be time-consuming, covering it all, and we don’t actually want to spook people into distrusting Vanyel even more. Just, I wanted to make sure you saw the downsides as well.”

“I see the downsides.” Randi shifted his weight against the pillows, rubbing the back of his neck. “It’s always a difficult thing to manage. Which secrets to keep, and how closely.”

“I know.” And she wasn’t sure she liked where Randi was choosing to make that tradeoff, even if at the same time she was relieved that it wasn’t her decision. “Randi, just… It’s turning the whole thing into politics, and the Heralds aren’t meant to be like that.” 

Randi’s eyebrows rose. “It’s always been like that,” he said mildly.

Maybe – it might be the kind of thing that was normally invisible to her. “I don’t like it,” she said quietly, looking away. “Having to choose exactly what I can say out loud. Keeping track of who’s pushing for what.” Reading faces and bodies, trying to guess what her fellow Heralds were thinking and not saying – Kellan had been helping her, of course, but it still wore her down. “It’s exhausting, and it doesn’t feel like we’re working together. We should be on the same team in this.”

“We could all wish for a world where everyone got along and understood each other.” A hint of irritation in Randi’s voice. “If wishes were fishes, we’d never go hungry.”

_No, you don’t understand. _Savil wasn’t sure why she felt so frustrated and helpless; it was a prickly ball in her chest and she couldn’t seem to untangle it. “Randi, sometimes I want to say what I think, but I can’t say why. It feels dishonest.” She was embarrassed by the edge in her voice, she knew she was whining, but what was she supposed to say? Their jobs were hard enough without bringing politicking into it. That sort of social maneuvering was meant to be reserved for dealing with the Council; the whole _point _of Heralds was to be able to trust one another.

Speaking of that. “We need to tell the Council at some point. If we want to move to an actual war-footing.” She was very impressed at how well Randi had finagled the vote to annex the north, without needing to bring in anything about a dark mage called Leareth. He was more skilled at that sort of politicking than anyone had ever expected. Still, there were limits.

“I know. It’s going to be a nightmare.” Randi groaned. “Can you imagine? Every lord maneuvering for it to benefit them and their landholdings somehow. I’d rather avoid that complication as long as we can.”

“They’re not going to like that we kept it from them.”

“Let them dislike it. They’ll get over it.” The King sighed. Savil wasn’t sure she had ever heard such deep weariness in his voice. Noticing it, she could feel sympathy for him, dissolving some of her frustration. He hadn’t asked to be King at all, let alone to be saddled with a problem on the scale of Leareth – something that would divide the Heralds, eating away at a centuries-old foundation of trust. 

Randi leaned back in his chair, wincing. “Honestly, ramming a war declaration through with the Council would be a _lot _easier than the alternative.”

Of getting the Council to approve an alliance with a foreign bloodpath mage? Yes, that part certainly seemed true. Especially given that Leareth wasn’t likely to want any normal kind of alliance. Savil hadn’t actually put much thought into what he would want, but, presumably, either a complete lack of interference in his plan, or active help with it.

Even if they decided that was the best option – unlikely as that seemed – Savil didn’t see any way they could actually make that happen. Randi was very good at wrangling the Council, but not _that _good. Even if the Heralds all eventually agreed that Leareth had some good points, were they still doomed to end up in a fight to the death, driven down the path of expedience?

What would it do to Vanyel, if that was how it ended up going?

Well, for one, there was a very good chance he wouldn’t survive it.

Savil knew that wasn’t the only cost, or even the steepest. A war would kill thousands, a war with someone like Leareth might not be winnable at all, and if they _did _win, somehow, maybe it would only be temporary and Leareth would just begin again elsewhere.

_Damn it all to high hells, this is such a complete disaster. _


	7. Chapter Seven

Vanyel finished the song, and started to pack away his lute. Dara opened her mouth, to ask him to play another, and stopped herself. _I shouldn’t push him if he’s tired. _She was pleased that she had coaxed him to take out the instrument at all; she had the sense it was something he enjoyed, but would never think to do just for pleasure. He wasn’t as good as a real Bard, she could tell that his fingerings were rusty, but she had enjoyed it anyway. _I wish I had a singing voice like his. _

“Well, that’s it,” Vanyel said quietly, buckling the straps on the case. “One more day and we’re out of Rethwellan.”

Their journey had been going very smoothly. Dara would have said ‘too smoothly’, but it wasn’t like there was anything suspicious there, or in need of explanation – only that she was traveling with Vanyel, the most powerful mage in the realm and bestowed with just about every other Gift as well. They certainly _would _have run into trouble, a time or two, if not for his checking the path ahead with Farsight.

Dara broke another piece off the stick she was holding and tossed it absently into the campfire. “I’m going to miss the roads.” Rethwellan had an incredibly well-maintained road network, paved by mage-craft, patrolled by their peacekeeping Guard. Dara had spoken to various merchants coming the other direction, and Vanyel had verified their claims by looking ahead with Farsight – Jkatha’s roads weren’t nearly as good, especially not when the heavy spring rains had ended so recently, and unlike Rethwellan, they had very little Guard presence maintaining law and order. It was apparently common for trade-caravans to hire mercenary companies in Mournedealth, the first large city past the Border-crossing, in order to pass through the kingdom unmolested.

The two of them wouldn’t need that. This far south, they couldn’t necessarily rely on the deterrence of their Whites, would-be bandits realizing in advance how bad an idea it was to attack a Herald on Companion-back – but Vanyel would have no difficulty defending them.

Vanyel settled back against Yfandes’ flank. The flickering firelight cast his cheekbones in sharp relief. Dara tried not to stare too obviously; damn it but it was a waste, that he wasn’t interested in women.

“It shouldn’t slow us by too much,” he said. “Since we’re not bringing a wagon through.”

A fair point.

“I’ll do the talking at the Border-crossing,” he added. “I don’t think we should have any difficulties, with the letter of passage the King gave us, but – well, it’s probably been a century since a Herald of Valdemar came this way.”

That was another perk of traveling with Herald-Mage Vanyel Demonsbane. Even in the smallest towns they had passed through, everybody knew his name. They had been granted an audience with the King of Rethwellan within candlemarks of their arrival in Petras, and Vanyel had smooth-talked his way to an impressively broad letter of endorsement – and made an opening for a discussion of a renewed mutual defence treaty on their return.

The King hadn’t looked too well, Dara thought. He was in his seventies, and could barely get around with the aid of two canes.

Vanyel stretched and stood. “I’m going to bed.”

“I’ll come in a bit.” Dara wasn’t especially sleepy yet. “I’ll be quiet, I promise.” They were sharing a tent that she had purchased in the Petras market from their travel-purse, at Vanyel’s request. Dara had forgotten that there wouldn’t be any Heralds’ Waystations once they left Valdemar, nor free room and board at any inn when they showed a Heraldic token, though it seemed Vanyel preferred not to spend every night at an inn anyway. On this side of Petras, most of the small-town citizens had never even seen a Herald, or a Companion, and found them delightfully exotic. Dara enjoyed the attention. Rolan did as well. Vanyel didn’t.

Alone, Dara poked the end of her stick into the fire, watching the wood crisp and blacken, littler flames rising. Maybe she would have another helping of the stew she had put together in their camp-pot, beans and barley from their provisions, cooked up with wild fiddlehead ferns from the nearby woods, and a rabbit Vanyel had taken down with a levinbolt.

She remembered him looking sadly at the little animal as he held it by its hind feet, fur still smouldering. _Good thing Jisa isn’t here_, he had said. Dara hadn’t known what he meant, and hadn’t asked.

She thought she was making a good enough showing of herself, overall. Maybe she couldn’t navigate the politics like Vanyel could, yet, but she had been the one arranging their stays at various inns, buying food and supplies, and otherwise managing all the logistical conversations that needed to happen. She had the sense that Vanyel found talking to strangers a lot more stressful and tiring than she did, and she didn’t mind anyway – it seemed like good practice, and it forced her to get past her occasional shyness. It let her work on her Rethwellani as well; she had learned in the classroom, but never had the opportunity to speak it much for real.

Not to mention, she had successfully rescued three milkmaids from stablehands harassing them, and broken up two disputes in taverns. Neither had actually involved any fighting on her part. Dara had wondered, vaguely, if Need was starting her out with easy scenarios on purpose – not that it didn’t feel good, to step in and defend someone vulnerable, but she had been hoping for more excitement.

Then again, adventure wasn’t the point of this journey, as Rolan had pointed out, patiently and repeatedly. Dara thought there was a case to be made that letting Need have her way would help her to ‘wake up’ faster, and thus increase the chance that the sword would be able to offer information on Leareth, but Rolan was dubious. Maybe rightly. It was tenuous reasoning, and Dara had to admit, to herself at least, that it was mostly an excuse.

They had been on the road about three weeks, and crossed some three hundred and fifty miles – more than half of the distance they had to cover overland, though it was likely to be the easier half. It was strange, being so very far from home. _What would you think of me now, Ma? _Dara had gone home every year for the Midsummer festival, and every time, there had been less and less to say to her mother, or to her once-friends.

…At her side, Need stirred, and Dara felt the now-familiar tug deep inside, somewhere behind her navel.

Dara reached for the sword. _:Need, what is it?: _She hadn’t expected anything tonight – they were miles from the nearest town-crossing. So far, Need had tugged at her the most during their three days in Petras, and she had wondered if it was really so much worse a place to live than anywhere else, until Vanyel had pointed out it was probably a matter of population. Dara had tried her best to ignore those calls; Shavri had warned her that Need liked to ‘make a scene’, and she hadn’t wanted to set off a diplomatic incident in the capital of an allied kingdom.

_:Danger: _Need sent, her odd papery mindvoice brushing Dara’s shields. It was definitely a word, even if it had the feel of someone talking in their sleep.

Dara thought for a moment, but only a moment, and then stood up. _:Where are we going?: _There really wasn’t anything nearby.

_:Too far to walk: _

Wow, that had almost been a whole sentence.

Dara considering waking Rolan. Riding him, she could move very fast – and she felt Need’s surge of displeasure. Need, she had noticed, didn’t much approve of Rolan.

Well, fair enough. Rolan didn’t exactly approve of Need either.

_:Don’t badmouth him: _Dara sent, annoyed. _:He’s my Companion: _

The mental equivalent of a disgusted snort. Need, Dara thought, wasn’t used to sharing.

_:Fine: _Dara sent. _:I won’t wake him: _Rolan might refuse anyway, and try to stop her from going. _:How else can we get there?:_

A pause. _:Farm. Close: _Need sent. _:Borrow horses: _

Dara wrinkled her nose. _:Borrow. Are we going to bring it back after?: _

The tugging intensified. _:Move, girl!: _

Dara felt a thrill of excitement. Need hadn’t been nearly this insistent before – so maybe, this time, it was real danger.

Maybe a candlemark later, Dara was tugging at the reins of her ‘borrowed’, definitely-not-stolen horse, swearing under her breath. She had forgotten that riding an ordinary horse wasn’t at all like riding a Companion, and she had barely any practice with the former. Need might have done something to the mare to get her to come along with them, but the damned beast wasn’t happy at _all _about walking in the dark, even if the moon was high and bright and the narrow side-lane, that apparently led to a small village off the main road, was clear and level.

_:Almost there!: _Need sent. _:Hurry!: _

The sword’s call inside her had grown more and more frantic over the last half-candlemark.

“I’m trying!” Dara dug her heels into the mare’s sides.

–Need must have done something, because a moment later the mare lifted her head and broke into a trot, then a canter. Dara winced as she bounced up and down in the saddle, Need rattling in the scabbard at her side – Rolan’s gait was a _lot _smoother than this, and she hadn’t realized what a difference that made.

_Maybe I should have woken him… _It was sinking in that she was miles away from their camp now, and that none of her travel-companions knew where she was. It would probably go fine – she wasn’t alone, and Shavri had claimed that Need would help her fight beyond her own skills if needed – but Rolan wouldn’t think much of it in the morning.

No time for regrets now. Ahead, off in the distance, Dara could see the flickering glow of firelight.

She heard screams. The vibrating tension in her chest rose even higher. _:Need, what is it? Bandits?: _

_:Go!: _Need barked in her head, not answering the question. _:Go go go!: _

She could see the humped shapes of buildings ahead now, a village square. Her mare started slowed to a walk, and Dara tried to dismount, nearly catching her foot in the stirrup and falling on her face.

_Oof. _Her entire behind ached, and her legs were like jelly.

_:Move!: _Need cried out.

Behind the outline of a large, square building, maybe the village inn or town hall, maybe just a barn, something was on fire. Dara couldn’t see what. _Oh, no… _

She knotted the mare’s reins loosely over a tree-branch, and then carefully, her hands only shaking a little, drew the sword.

Within seconds, her legs had stopped hurting, and the blade in her hand no longer felt heavy at all. She felt strong, alert, fully alive – there was a fierce exultation soaring in her, and she had forgotten what it was like to be afraid.

Sword raised, Dara started to run.

–A flash, the squat thatch-roofed building next to the maybe-inn was in flames.

Men clad in dark leathers, armed with daggers, forming a circle around a huddle of others. Women and children, mostly in bed-gowns, faces white and terrified in the firelight.

A sliver of fear made it through the singing rage that rose in her. This _did _look like bandits, and there were at least ten of them, and only one of her.

Dara couldn’t have run away from it, any more than she could have learned to fly.

“Stop!” Dara screamed, charging towards the cluster. “Leave them alone!” She was still wearing her Whites – hopefully these men had heard of Heralds, and that would give them pause.

Laughter.

“Looks like we missed one of the children–” someone started to jeer.

Dara skidded to a halt, a yard away, and brandished the sword in the man’s face. “I said. Leave. Them. Alone.”

–A fireball flew at her face.

Startled, Dara screamed, flinging up her free arm over her head. She needn’t have bothered – somehow, the fire streamed off of something just in front of her nose.

_:Fight, girl!: _Need snapped at her. _:Go!: _

Dara stumbled back. _They have a mage they have a mage they have a mage–_

_:Don’t you dare freeze up on me!:_

Wow, that had _definitely _been a whole sentence – but there wasn’t time to be pleased about it. Dara felt her body begin to move with no intention on her part, taking a step forward. It was a deeply unnerving, awful feeling, and she struggled against it, flailing – and only managed to trip over her own feet, landing hard on her bottom.

Someone was laughing again.

Another fireball raced at her. Again, something blocked it.

_:Get up and fight!: _Need shrieked into her mind.

Dara struggled onto her heels, blinking back tears of frustration and pain and sheer terror. _This was such a bad idea. _Her mouth felt very dry and she couldn’t hear anything over the roar of her own pulse in her ears.

Even so, there was a small corner of her mind that was still. _Think, _a quiet voice whispered. _What do you need to do? _

Avoid dying, for one.

She could run away, her stolen horse wasn’t far – but the bandits might have horses as well. And, besides, that would mean leaving behind a village’s worth of women and children, at the mercy of these men and their mage.

Why hadn’t anyone from the village itself stepped up in defence?

Worry about it later. Dara rose to her feet, thrusting the sword out in front of her, buying a moment’s time to think.

A bolt of purple lightning wasted itself against an invisible wall, inches from her eyeballs. Dara blinked hard, trying to dispel the spots suddenly dancing in her vision.

_:I can’t keep this up forever!: _Need complained, and Dara could feel the sword trying to take over her limbs again. It took every scrap of will she had to resist that compulsion.

_Call for help, _the quiet voice whispered. _This is too much to handle on your own. _

Rolan wasn’t going to be pleased at _all _– but that was far from her most important problem.

Center and ground. Open. Reach. _:Rolan!: _she screamed. _:Help!: _

She felt him come awake, instantly, flowing into her mind. Felt his surprise, carefully tamped down and, as usual, distant and alien. Not like the way a human would experience shock at all.

If Rolan was angry, he had clearly decided to set it aside until later. _:I’m coming: _he sent. _:Hold on, Chosen: _

The distance that she had needed a candlemark to cover, her Groveborn Companion might cross in five minutes. Which suddenly seemed like a very, very long time to face off ten bandits and a mage, alone.

Not alone.

_I don’t have a choice. _Shavri had sworn that Need would make her invincible, but that was probably conditional on her accepting the sword’s help. Dara closed her eyes, took a deep breath, opened them – and opened some part of herself, letting the fierce, blazing song that was Need fully into her.

With a grace that wasn’t hers, her body blurred into motion.

Flash. The ring of steel on steel, as a dagger glanced from the blade in her hands.

Flash. Dara was bent over, pulling the sword out of a bandit’s chest. It made a wet sucking noise.

_No. _For a single frantic moment, she fought against Need’s control, trying to reclaim her limbs – and found herself staggering, nearly falling.

_:Stop it!: _Need barked, sounding exactly like a disapproving grandmother – and clearer, more like a person, than ever before. _:Can’t afford your damned scruples right now, girl. We’re outnumbered. Just let me handle this: _

Dara whimpered, but Need was right. She couldn’t win this fight with her own skills alone; letting Need take over was the only was she would last until Rolan arrived.

Surrender to it.

Flash. Fire streamed past on either side of her, and even through the invisible barrier, Dara could feel the heat of it scorching her cheeks.

Flash. She felt, more than saw, the man’s head separate from his shoulders and roll away as he fell. By all rights the sword in her hands shouldn’t have been sharp enough to _do _that, but it seemed the rules didn’t apply to Need.

There were no more fireballs.

Flash. A woman on the ground, terrified face gazing up at Dara, a toddler in each arm and a boy of maybe six clinging to her skirts, as Dara stepped in front of them and ran the charging bandit through.

Flash. Bodies on the ground. “Get back!” Dara screamed at the three young women clinging to each other, “get out of the way–” and then she was out of time, Need spinning her around –

Flash. Ten yards away, a white-haired man in a sleeping-robe, struggling up from his knees, gnarled hand clenched around a kitchen cleaver, two young boys huddled behind him. The old man brandished his cleaver at –

A woman in dark leathers, fair hair trimmed short, drawing her daggers.

_Oh, no –_

Dara felt Need’s confusion, a tripping feeling inside her.

She saw all of it happen in slow motion, Need’s indecision, then reaction, her charge forward, and there should have been time to stop it but there wasn’t. Dara rammed between the two bodies, spun around, sword poised above the white-haired oldster’s head.

At the very, very last second, she managed to divert the killing strike, turning it into a blow across the temple with the flat of the blade.

He went limp, falling, the cleaver slipping from his hand. Two young voices shrieked in terror.

_:No!: _Dara screamed, flailing for Need’s strange mind-that-wasn’t-a-mind. _:What are you doing?:_

–No time to answer, Need wrenched her body around, pivoting, raising her arm just in time to parry the woman-bandit’s daggers.

And then hesitating, that same indecisiveness. Need clearly balked at killing a woman, even if she was outright attacking them.

_:Just knock her out or something!:_Dara shouted at Need.

Dodging again, she found herself blocking a strike, then reversing the motion, slamming the sword-pommel up under the woman’s chin.

The bandit fell.

Dara crumpled to her knees, in the sudden silence. Her chest was heaving, pulse racing, and she felt sick to her stomach. _Oh no, oh no, oh no…_

_:Chosen!: _Rolan’s mindvoice, and it took Dara a moment to realize that her Companion had been calling into her mind over and over. _:Dara, are you all right?:_

_:I don’t know: _She sat back on her heels, lifting one hand to rub her eyes. There was blood on her knuckles. _Where did that come from? _

_:We’re on our way: _Rolan sent.

A cut on her upper arm was oozing, staining her Whites around the tear in the cloth, but she didn’t feel the pain of it at all.

_Focus. _Dara set Need carefully on the ground – and nearly fell over, exhaustion hitting her like a rock wall as soon as her fingers left the hilt, sudden pain blooming in her arm and back. Her calves were cramping and there was a stitch in her side.

_Breathe. _She spent a few moment on hands and knees, just trying to force air in and out, and then prodded herself into motion, crawling over to the rag-doll body of the old man, sprawled on the ground. _Not dead, please, don’t let him be dead…_

Dara felt for a pulse, and found one, but it was slow and thready. The old man’s forehead was clammy, and his breath came unevenly.

Dara looked up, and found herself staring into the faces of two children. Both boys, tawny hair hacked off short and hanging around their round faces.

“I’m sorry!” she heard herself say, between gasps. “It was…an accident…” If you could call it that. She was an idiot. She should have seen it coming–

And it was too late to do anything about it. She wasn’t a Healer.

Dara ducked her head, looking away from their frightened eyes.

It couldn’t have been more than five minutes later, when she heard hoofbeats like bells rapidly approaching, but it felt like an eternity. Need had lapsed into silence again, now that the action was over; was she asleep again?

There was probably something she should have been doing. Checking if anyone was injured, at the very least – but she couldn’t make herself move. She didn’t want to meet anyone’s eyes.

_:Chosen!: _And Rolan was there, galloping into the square and then planting all four feet and coming to a sudden stop, a yard away.

Dara didn’t look up. _I’m sorry, _she thought, not quite putting the word into Mindspeech.

Rolan bent his head towards her, nostrils snuffling at her face, his mane falling to tickle her forehead. _:Are you hurt?:_

_:Not really: _Her heart was finally slowing, and she had almost caught her breath. Various cuts she didn’t remember getting were stinging, and she could feel the ache of bruises – but nothing more than cuts and bruises.

More hoofbeats. “Dara!” Vanyel’s voice. “What’s going on?”

There was a whooshing sound, and the air was suddenly chilly. Something else was different… Dara’s head spun around. The fire that had been sullenly burning behind them was out, leaving the blackened remains of what must have once been a storage-hut.

Dara tucked her chin into her chest, feeling her cheeks grow hot with shame. _This isn’t how I meant it to go… _

She heard a thud as he slid down from Yfandes’ back. Footsteps approaching. A moment later: “You called for help? Honestly, it looks like you’ve got this well in hand.”

Dara clenched her eyes shut, tears seeping out from under her eyelids. She couldn’t speak, so she reached out with her mind. _:Vanyel, I made a mistake: _

Vanyel accepted his end of the link, and she didn’t sense any judgment from him. _:What can I help with?:_

She tried to think. _:We should check if anyone is–: _Oh. She had just remembered. Vanyel was a little bit of a Healer. _:Vanyel, I – Need – I sort-of-accidentally whacked him in the head: _She gestured in the direction of the still-unconscious man. _:Can you…?:_

_:Of course: _She heard the scuff of his boots in the dirt, then the rustle of cloth as he knelt.

Dara made herself take a deep breath. _Pull yourself together, girl. _She was shaking and she still felt sick to her stomach, but there was more to be done.

For one, she probably ought not to leave a sword covered in blood lying on the ground, where someone might step on it. With a great deal of reluctance, she reached for the hilt again.

Need didn’t speak to her, not in words, but she felt…apologetic?

_:We’re going to talk about this later: _Dara sent, with more bravado than she felt.

Another candlemark later, it was really over.

Vanyel had taken charge of the frightened villagers, none of whom had ever heard of a certain Herald Vanyel out of songs and tales. Nevertheless, two of the older women knew of Heralds as a general concept, and once the muttered whispers went around, they had been trusting enough with him. Even the children. Vanyel was good with children, Dara thought – he spoke gently to them, but seriously, like they were adults who just happened to be shorter than him.

He had spoken to her like that, she remembered, when she had first been Chosen; he had never treated her like less of a person because of her youth.

Vanyel had recruited their aid in carrying the injured old man indoors. Dara had remembered to ask for rope, and tied up the woman, the only one of the bandits who was still breathing. She didn’t even remember killing most of them – it had all gone by in a blur.

She felt like throwing up every time she thought about it.

There were cuts and bruises all around – the bandits had shoved the villagers around, in the process of dragging them out of their homes. One elderly woman had a broken wrist from when she had fallen badly, a girl had a dislocated shoulder, and there were a few sprained ankles, but no life-threatening injuries.

Dara had gathered herself enough to speak to the apparent leader, a sturdy woman with iron-grey hair who trailed three grandchildren and spoke in a Rethwellani dialect that Dara could barely understand. She had eventually learned that all their able-bodied men were a day’s journey away, net-fishing the river, like they did every spring and autumn ‘when the fish moved.’ The timing of the attack had either been appallingly bad luck, or deliberately planned.

All of the villagers had thanked her effusively, which only made Dara more uncomfortable. _I handled it so badly. _

She shouldn’t have gone in alone; she should have swallowed her pride, and woken Rolan right away. In hindsight, it had been incredibly stupid to wander off in the middle of the night and assume a lone girl of sixteen with a sword could solve any problem she came across.

She was sitting pointlessly at the old man’s bedside, inside a sturdy cottage with a fire burning in the hearth, trying not to yawn, when Vanyel’s hand fell on her shoulder.

_:We should go: _he sent.

_:But–:_

_:I’ve done everything I can for him: _Vanyel shook his head. _:’Fandes is riding with one of the youngsters for the nearest town that has a real Healer:_

_:What?: _Dara sent, blankly. It was nearly unheard of for a Companion to let anyone but their Herald ride them, except sometimes to amuse very young children – she had never met a Companion who didn’t enjoy littles.

_:Well, someone had to go, and it seemed better for me to stay here. She’ll bring them back riding double, and then rejoin us: _Vanyel squeezed her shoulder. _:You can ride Rolan, and I’ll take your ‘borrowed’ horse back to her owners before they wake up. It all works out: _

Dara avoided his eyes. _:I was going to bring her back: _

_:I know you were, I never said otherwise: _Vanyel’s eyes creased at the corners, a sad smile that didn’t touch his mouth. _:It’s late. We both ought to sleep: _

Dara wasn’t sure if she would ever be able to sleep again.

_:I know: _Vanyel met her eyes steadily. _:It’ll keep until the morning:_

* * *

_This had better be important. _

Savil tried not to let her impatience show on her face. They were finally settling into a sort of routine, after the double blow of Dakar’s death and Vanyel’s departure; she had sat down with Kilchas and Sandra and re-mapped out the next six months worth of routine mage-work, ruthlessly cancelling anything that could wait, leaving Tran with the job of passing on to the various involved parties that their promised work had been delayed. With those commitments reduced, she finally had enough time for meetings and handling Web-alarms, but there wasn’t much slack left over.

“Thank you for making time for me,” Melody said. “I know you’re busy.”

“It’s no trouble.” Savil gestured at the other chairs. “Sit down. What is this about?” Her eyes drifted over the two other faces – an elderly woman, grey hair combed and neatly braided, and a lanky, tawny-haired boy of about fourteen. Both of their features had a foreign cast that she couldn’t quite place.

Melody sat. The other two remained standing.

“This is Natti Ermane,” Melody said, “and this is her grandson, Arkady Mavelan.”

_Mavelan? _

Savil, with effort, kept the shock and involuntary distaste off her face, and nodded to each of them. The older woman smiled, politely, and bobbed her head; the youngster avoided her eyes. His arms were folded across his chest, like he was cold, or trying to make himself small. He had twitched when his name was said, but made no sound at all.

“As you might guess, they both hail from Baires,” Melody said. “Arkady was born there. Natti wasn’t. In fact, at one point about thirty-five years ago, she very briefly called Valdemar home. Traderest, right, Natti?”

The woman bobbed her head again. “Four months,” she said, in careful, accented Valdemaran. “My Parva could not find work.”

“Natti’s husband,” Melody said, “was a mage-engineer trained in the Eastern Empire. They left almost forty years ago – maybe it would be more accurate to say they fled. Natti’s husband was a political dissident of sorts, and he found himself no longer welcome.”

Savil blinked, suddenly feeling more alert. “The Eastern Empire?” she said carefully. “You traveled that far?”

“It was a journey of years,” Natti said. One shoulder rose and fell, and her voice was light, but pain lurked underneath. “I never wished to leave. Seemed we had no choice. They would have killed him otherwise. Only a matter of time.” A faint smile. “We had heard good spoken of Valdemar.”

“However,” Melody went, “given that he wasn’t Chosen, Natti’s husband was unable to find any sort of skilled work as a mage in Valdemar. They had heard rumours of a small kingdom run by mages, though, so they kept moving, took the north fork from Exile’s Road, and traveled all the way to the Baires border. In fact, it sounds like they very briefly stayed in Forst Reach Village.”

“Your home, I hear?” Natti said politely.

Thirty-five years ago… “I wasn’t there,” Savil said, a little curtly. “I had already been a Herald for decades.” And Vanyel wouldn’t have been born yet.

“Anyway,” Melody said, “the nation of Baires was very happy to take in a trained mage, regardless of where he came from – and when their firstborn daughter, born only a month after they settled in Qorthes, turned out to be powerfully mage-gifted as well, she was accepted to the training-program run by the Mavelan family. She married Rodrick Mavelan, a second cousin to the royal family, and fourteen years ago Arkady was born.”

The old woman’s expression softened, and she reached to ruffle the lad’s hair.

“Her husband died of a brainstorm six years ago,” Melody said.

A shadow crossed Natti’s face. “Too young. Only seventy. But they do not have Healers here like we did in the East.”

Interesting. Savil would have said that Valdemar had excellent Healers, compared to its neighbours, though maybe that hadn’t reached Baires yet.

Melody cast her a sympathetic look. “And then, four years ago – well, you know what happened.”

Vedric Mavelan, uniting his entire family in a concert-meld… And dying, all of them dying together, burned out by the force of Herald-Mage Donni’s Final Strike. It had seemed like such a pointless waste. Somehow Savil had never thought to consider how it would look from the other side.

“My Arkady lost both his parents that day,” Natti said. She reached for the boy’s shoulder, but he jerked away from her. “It was not much later that he first showed mage-powers.”

Oh. Savil made a face, suddenly guessing where this was going.

“Exactly.” Melody’s voice was very calm – if Savil hadn’t known her well, she would never have guessed at the anger underlying it. “Learning to control a fledging mage-gift with the _vrondi _watching your every move, when there isn’t any school of mage-craft left to speak of, isn’t much fun.”

Savil winced. _I never even thought of that. _There had been no new mage-gifted _trainees_, and so she must have assumed that Baires had the same problem as the rest of Valdemar, and neglected to realize that there might be untrained, mage-gifted children there who weren’t Chosen. Not that it indicated something systemic or ongoing, necessarily – it sounded like poor Arkady’s Gift must have awakened just before Baires became a part of Valdemar, thus the Web, and the _vrondi _started watching.

“Natti heard about Lord Tashir’s state visit to Haven,” Melody went on, “and she packed up everything, took her grandson to Highjorune and begged to come along. Tashir allowed it, at which point I met her and Arkady along with the others, when Jisa and I were assessing their Gifts and…other qualities. Arkady is only a child, and he deserves better than this.” A pause. “I know we’re not really set up to train mages who aren’t Heralds.”

Savil wasn’t sure what to say. Melody was right, it sounded like Arkady was actually worse off in Valdemar than he would be somewhere like Rethwellan – they had a mage-academy run under the King, that took anyone who could pass the entry tests, and other, more exclusive and secretive mage-schools besides. And no watching _vrondi _to torture an untrained youngster.

“Something else came up,” Melody went on, her voice oddly flat. “Natti?”

The elderly woman looked Savil in the eye. “My Parva is dead. What he knew is gone – and he was the trained mage, not myself. We were able to take little with us, but he did take some of his books and notes. To train our future children, he said, if they were mages.” The woman gestured at a very old-looking, cracked leather case that lay at her feet. “I have them.” A stubborn look came into her eyes. “I will give them to you. If you train my grandson.”

Arkady curled further into himself, eyes fixed on the floor.

“I need a minute to think about it, Natti,” Savil said.

The woman nodded, patient, and fixed her eyes demurely on her shoes.

_:Melody?: _Savil sent, suspicious. _:I know you’re bringing this to me for a reason. What’s your motive?: _

_:I want you to agree, obviously: _Melody’s mindvoice was mild, but with a hint of impatience. _:Unfortunately, it sounds like Valdemar already missed out on a priceless opportunity, when we drove Parva out. A disgruntled former mage of the Eastern Empire… He could have taught you an awful lot. But we still have an opportunity. If you’re willing to look past your odd prejudice against working with non-Heralds, which you really ought to be – you’ve already got some of their adults joining the Guard: _

A valid point. Keiran had made unhappy faces about it, and Savil wasn’t sure how she felt either – the Baires mages had trained under such a different school of ethics, it was hard to know if they could ever bridge that gap – but it had seemed worth trying. For now they were barracked in Haven, and she was supposed to find time to work with them.

She turned her gaze back to the boy in front of her. He hadn’t looked up once; he was hunched into himself, hair fallen across his face. Certainly he didn’t look like a youngster who was eager to impress his future teacher.

_:Why hasn’t he been Chosen?: _she mused, half to herself. _:Melody, did you See anything in his mind, to explain why not?: _

_:Well, he’s hardly a saint: _Melody sighed. _:But he’s no worse than most children, in my opinion. He’s been through a lot, and he’s going to be slow to trust anyone. Particularly a Herald of Valdemar. He knows who was responsible for killing his parents: _

Savil hadn’t thought of it that way. _:Oh: _No wonder the boy wouldn’t look at her. _:Wait. How does Natti feel about us?: _She had seemed much warmer.

_:She understands better: _Melody sent. _:She was horrified when it came out what the Mavelan family had been doing. And Lord Tashir did provide for them – he offered a stipend to anyone who lost their livelihood in the whole debacle. Not much, but enough that she was able to keep Arkady fed and clothed until she found work, and send him to school to learn his letters and figuring, if not control of his magic: _A pause. _:Though that brought some more difficulties. It sounds like his classmates weren’t exactly kind to him. No one in Baires wants anything to do with the Mavelans, anymore: _

There was an ache of sympathy in her chest now.

_:He was starting to lash out at them: _Melody confessed. _:Natti told me. He would lose his temper, and he can’t control his power much, but enough to hurt the bullies in return. She pulled him out of the classes and kept him at home with her, in the end: _A pause. _:I think the vrondi are contributing. He’s constantly on edge, well, you would be too if it felt like someone was watching you all the time. It’s a wonder he’s not in worse shape: _

Savil sighed. It made perfect sense, really, but that didn’t make it better. _:Melody, how am I supposed to train a youngster who hates Heralds? Who’s already formed the habit of using his Gifts in very unethical ways?: _

_:I don’t know, but you’re a very experienced teacher: _Melody shrugged. _:I’ll do what I can with him. He may be faster to trust me – he’s got nothing against Healers yet, it seems, and that’s what he seems to think I am. Sounds like they’ve never heard of Mindhealers over there: _

That made sense. Savil closed her eyes, trying to think. Upside: a satchel full of old books from the Eastern Empire, that might give her answers she had been seeking for years. Concert-Gates, permanent Gates, who knew what else… The title of ‘mage-engineer’ was a very intriguing one.

Downside: an emotionally unstable trainee with out-of-control Gifts, who hated Heralds, and who didn’t even have a Companion to keep him in line. Still, his past wasn’t his fault, and he certainly wasn’t to blame for who his parents were.

_We did wrong by him. _They had known about the issue with the Baires mages and the _vrondi _for years, and done nothing about it.

There was only one answer she could give.

“I’ll need to ask King Randale, Natti,” she said finally, opening her eyes and smiling at the woman. “But I’ll do my best to convince him of it, so hopefully the answer is a yes.”

* * *

The band of tension behind his brow, and the hot, itchy feeling in his eyes, both told Vanyel that he really hadn’t gotten enough sleep. A predictable consequence of staying up until the early hours of the morning rescuing a random out-of-the-way village from a bandit attack.

Dara, huddled in front of the cold firepit, looked like she might not have slept at_ all. _She radiated misery even through her shields.

Vanyel sighed and rubbed his shoulder, which ached – he hadn’t even been fighting, damn it, Dara had taken care of all that before he even got there. He had wrenched it somehow trying to assist a young woman with a twisted ankle back to her cottage, while carrying both of her crying toddlers.

_:’Fandes?: _he sent. She and Rolan were nowhere to be seen – they had probably gone off in search of lusher grass for breakfast.

_:You’re awake?: _A hint of disapproval. _:I hoped you would sleep in: _

_:I tried: _The dawn light had woken him, filtering through the waterproofed canvas of their tent. _:Do you think–:_

_:Chosen, I think we ought to stay put: _she finished for him. _:You’re exhausted and Dara’s a mess. Do you really want to talk your way across the Border today?:_

No, but he wasn’t sure he wanted to hang around their makeshift camp all day either, and he didn’t like the delay.

_:We could pack up and head to the next town: _Yfandes suggested. _:Book a room in the inn for a night. Take a bath, have someone else cook your food…: _

She could always make it sound tempting, emphasizing the comfort and playing down the fact that inns were inevitably noisy and full of people who wanted to _talk _to him. _:Maybe in a few candlemarks: _Vanyel allowed. _:I need to talk to Dara: _

He wasn’t looking forward to it. Dara had always seemed so mature; he had managed to forget she was only sixteen. Last night had been the first time she had ever killed anyone, and she was clearly taking it hard.

Yfandes sent a waft of affection. _:I know, love. Why don’t you do some stretches and make tea first?:_

Both of those sounded good. Vanyel stood up, trying not to groan. _Damn it, I’m getting old. _It had been years since he last slept on a bedroll in a tent, and it seemed he woke up every morning stiff and aching all over.

He carried over three logs from the pile he had chopped the night before, and used a tendril of mage-power to set them blazing. It wasn’t that cold, but it was a cloudy grey morning, and the bright orange flames made it feel a little less dreary.

Dara didn’t even lift her head.

“Hey,” he said, quietly. “I’m going to do some exercises, try to warm up. You’re welcome to join me. I imagine you’re pretty sore from all that fighting.”

Dara didn’t move for a long moment, but finally uncurled – and grunted. “Ooh.” 

“I thought so.” He tried not to smirk. “Come on. It’ll help.”

Half a candlemark later, Vanyel had coaxed his muscles to loosen up, as much as they were going to without a hot bath, and he and Dara were both sitting around the campfire nursing cups of tea – he had sent Dara to fill their travel-pot and both of their waterskins from the river, figuring that giving her something useful to do would help her mood.

She was still quiet and avoiding his gaze, but she was sitting up straighter now.

Time to deal with the heaping pile of manure they were both ignoring. “Dara?” he said. “Can we talk about yesterday?”

Her head twitched up, eyes darting back and forth.

_She thinks we’re angry with her. _It was understandable enough. More than just the first time she had killed another human being – this was probably the first time she had made a real mistake, and paid the consequences of it.

Or, rather, someone else had.

He licked his lips. “Dara, listen. I’m guessing it feels like last night was a complete disaster, and nothing’s ever going to be the same. Is that right?”

This time, she met his eyes. “I mean. Yes.” Her voice was tight.

“That does make sense.” He leaned forward, unshielding and opening his weak Receptive Empathy as far as he could. “Dara, this is a very important lesson. You _will _make mistakes. Sometimes the consequences will be a lot worse than this. You can’t avoid it; it’s going to happen. I know it hurts, and it should hurt – but you can’t let it break you. All right?”

She stared at him blankly, leaking unhappiness and confusion.

“What did Rolan have to say about it?” he said gently.

Dara blinked a few times. “Not that,” she started, fidgeting with the bloodstained hem of her tunic. “He’s upset that I went without him. Said I put myself in danger. He’s _less _concerned about Need t-than he was, s-since I was able to stop her from c-controlling me, when I tried.” She gulped, swallowed. “Vanyel, he – he’s not angry that I killed them. Even though I didn’t have to.”

“Hmm.” Vanyel took a sip of tea, stalling, while he tried to find the right words. No, Rolan probably didn’t think that Dara butchering the bandits who had been sacking an undefended village, potentially to use its inhabitants as fuel for blood-magic – that had been his first guess, examining the mage’s body – was in any way a mistake.

“There is a argument it was justifiable,” he said finally. “It was their choice to harm others, and a lot of Heralds would say that does make their lives forfeit. That all else being equal, of course it would be better to take them alive and put them through a proper trial – but you were under attack, and taking them prisoner would have been riskier and more difficult, and so it’s hardly a great sin that you didn’t.”

Dara looked thoughtful – which was better than miserable and ashamed, at least. “Do you believe that?” she said finally. “I don’t want to know what ‘a lot of Heralds’ think. I want to know what _you _think.”

“No,” honesty compelled him to answer. He looked away, into the dancing red flames. _Here comes the part where I try to sound wise, and hope she doesn’t see right through it. _“Dara, it’s complicated. I don’t judge you particularly harshly for that particular mistake, and I think once you were in that situation, letting Need take over was your only – your best option.” Because it hadn’t been her only option. There were almost always choices, and she could have run away. “But…yes, I do think you made a mistake earlier on, and if you hadn’t we might have taken them alive. You are responsible for their deaths, even if it was the best option given the circumstances you had gotten yourself into.”

“Why?” Dara’s voice was soft. “If they were just bandits…?”

“They were still human beings.” He lifted his eyes to hers. “Every living person is a light in the world. Even bad people feel joy and pain, and I can still want to protect them. Sometimes killing them is the best trade we can make, to save the lives of a greater number, but it’s a tragedy all the same.”

“Oh.” Dara’s lips parted, her eyes widening. “That…” She twisted her hands together in her lap, around the wooden travel-cup. “Vanyel…is that something Leareth says?”

“Yes.” He ducked his head. “I know. It seems like a contradiction.”

“It seems like,” Dara agreed. “But maybe it isn’t? Maybe it’s possible for him to really, really care, and still…be ruthless, that way.”

“I think so.” _Careful, _Vanyel told himself. They were straying into territory that might be out of bounds – was it appropriate to have this conversation with the sixteen-year-old future King’s Own?

_No more secrets. _He was going to keep talking until Rolan ordered otherwise.

He swallowed. “I think he’s ruthless _because _he cares. About all the people, not just the ones close to him.” He shrugged. “That’s what he would say, anyway.”

Dara’s expression was a little dubious, but only a little. “I could see that,” she said finally. Her eyelids flickered. “Vanyel…how do you do it? You’ve had to kill so many people. How do you live with yourself?”

_Oh, Dara. _Vanyel blinked away sudden, unexpected tears. _Pull yourself together, Herald, _he told himself firmly._ You’re just maudlin because you didn’t sleep enough. _“It’s awful,” he said out loud. “Dara, I think it should hurt. If I ever let myself stop feeling that, then I’m not paying attention to the cost anymore.” The wind blew a lock of hair into his eyes, and he scraped it away. “Thing is, no one ever promised the world would offer you a reasonable option. Sometimes all the choices are awful, and you have to pick the least-awful of them, and grieve for it, and then move on.”

“Oh.” Dara shivered, and took a gulp of her tea. “I can’t… How do you live like that?”

“You get used to it.” He shook his head. “Dara, it’s normal to feel guilty. I think it’s _right _to feel guilty, when something bad happens and you were involved – but you need to ask the question, of what your guilt wants from you. Because you can’t go back and do it over, no matter how much you regret it; you can only change your decision-process so the same thing won’t happen again.”

Dara chewed her lip, a slight furrow appearing between her brows. “What did I do wrong?” she said finally.

Vanyel set down his empty cup and folded his arms. “You tell me.”

Silence.

“I shouldn’t let Need…” She stopped. Rubbed her eyes. “No, I think I had to let her fight for me. She – Vanyel, she protected me from the mage, I couldn’t’ve done that on my own, and if I’d run, they might have packed up and taken the villagers before you could arrive.”

He nodded, encouraging. “Do you think the mistake you made was earlier, then? Before it got to that point?”

A reluctant nod. “…I should’ve woken you and Rolan right away,” she said finally.

“Mmm. Why didn’t you?”

She frowned. “I didn’t want you to lose sleep. And I thought Rolan would try to argue me into not going.” Her eyes narrowed, fierce. “I’m not sorry I went. If I hadn’t…”

“If you hadn’t, the villagers would be dead or worse.” Vanyel nodded. “I do think there’s an argument that it wasn’t worth the risk to you. You know how important you are to Valdemar’s future.” Still, that didn’t feel right; something was tickling at the edge of his mind, and he wanted to drag it out into the world of words. “There is a cost to deciding not to risk yourself,” he said slowly. “I don’t really know how to say it. You’re a Herald, even outside Valdemar – your job is to protect people. Sometimes that’s going to mean choosing your battles, and sometimes you really do have to put your own safety first, but it can’t be your _first _priority, I don’t think.”

“Or I’ll lose sight of who I am.” Dara seemed to grasp it, or something – her eyes were alight. “What Heralds are for.” Her face tightened. “I don’t want to _ever _stop caring about villagers.”

“You don’t need to stop caring, to make a choice not to go in,” Vanyel pointed out. “It’ll hurt, when you have to decide it’s not worth the risk, or that something else is more important. Every single time.” It had for him, every time that exact situation came up out on the Border. “I think it should hurt. That’s how you hold to your values.” He smiled crookedly. “Even if Rolan might want to put your safety first. Our Companions can be overprotective sometimes.” He hoped Rolan wouldn’t take offence at that comment – no, actually, he found that he didn’t particularly care. It wasn’t like he was encouraging Dara to be reckless. “I wouldn’t have minded if you woke me,” he added. “It was worth losing a little sleep. If that’s your real reason.”

Dara started to open her mouth, affronted – and then settled back, thoughtful again. “Maybe it wasn’t my real reason,” she said finally, in a small voice. “I thought I could handle it on my own. I maybe wanted to show you that I could.”

“That’s very understandable. Dara, you don’t have to prove your courage to me, all right? Rolan Chose you. That’s all I need to know.”

“But–”

He held up a hand. “I didn’t say there was _nothing _you have to prove. I don’t entirely trust your judgment yet. Which I think is fair. You’re inexperienced, and you made a bad call last night. Nothing unforgivable, and nothing we can’t recover from, but still a mistake.”

Dara was blinking hard, her eyes glistening – but some of the knotted tension in her had eased. It was what she had needed to hear, Vanyel thought. Not reassurance, but honest reality.

“What about the old man?” she said finally, the words almost a whimper. “I hurt him, that was my fault…”

“Right. I’m guessing Need got confused, because it looked to her like a man was attacking a woman?”

Dara nodded. “I managed not to stab him – but I almost _killed _him! When he was just trying to defend his grandsons! And then Need didn’t want to kill the bandit woman even though she was attacking me…”

“I see the problem.” Vanyel smoothed down his trews. “She only cares about protecting women, and she’s not necessarily very nuanced about it.”

“It was like she was stuck and couldn’t decide,” Dara admitted. “And it felt a bit like she was sorry, after.”

“Then maybe it’s a good time to have a chat with her.” Vanyel raised his eyebrows. “Seems like she’s starting to wake up a little, now that we’re out of Valdemar?”

Dara frowned. “I’m not sure. It comes and goes.”

“Well, it’s worth a try. See if you can’t make the point to her that women aren’t always the ones in need of help.”

“Vanyel?” Dara’s voice was unsteady. “What if… Do you think Need is _bad_?”

“What? No.” Vanyel rubbed his chin, trying to find the right way to put it. “I’m…not sure ‘good’ or ‘bad’ is the best way to put it. She has certain goals, and some skill at achieving them. When they line up with your goals as well, it’s useful to work with her. And maybe you can convince her of broader values, but I wouldn’t count on it.” Biting back a yawn, Vanyel put his hands on his thighs and levered himself to his feet.

“Where are you going?” Dara said, turning her head to follow.

“To pack up my things.” He retrieved the empty cup. “Then I might lie down for a candlemark before I put the tent away. Figure we’ll wait for the Companions to get back from their walk, and then we can head to the next town over and find an inn.”

“We’re not crossing the Border today?” Dara started to stand as well. “I’m sorry, if I’d known–”

Vanyel flashed a smile at her. “It’s worth the delay. Dara, listen – it might not feel like it, since we’ve mostly been talking about your mistakes, but you did a good thing last night. I’m proud of you.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Aaaaand we finally get to have some action-adventure again!


	8. Chapter Eight

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I feel everyone should know that there apparently now exists crackfic of this AU! It's a Leareth POV prequel, it contains new worldbuilding (Haighlei Empire), and it is *hilarious*. The phrase "Pascal's fucking" is used. 
> 
> https://archiveofourown.org/works/21487672

_I want to go home. _

They had been gone for six weeks, and Vanyel had never missed his own room so fiercely. He was tired in a way that had nothing to do with how much he had slept recently, which had been plenty, Yfandes was nagging him about it incessantly – it was a weariness that seeped into his bones, born of waking every morning to unfamiliar surroundings, greeting unfamiliar faces, wrestling with a language he barely spoke fifty words of; he was fine when he could rely on the trade-tongue pidgin, which was mostly Rethwellani loanwords, but that wasn’t always. Even the trees were different, here, more than six hundred miles south of the Valdemaran border. Eight or nine hundred miles from Haven. It was hard to obtain clear maps of the area, so he wasn’t even sure.

Summer came earlier this far south, and Jkatha seemed to consist solely of heat, noise, and crowds. They had crossed the Border mostly without incident, though Vanyel had needed to put on some theatrics, and then stayed two days in Mournedealth – the less spoken of that, the better, though at least if Randi ever wanted to hire mercenaries, Vanyel now had about a dozen different contacts and Dara had twice that number. Then they had traveled on down the main Trade Road, which scarcely deserved that name, and taken nearly a week to reach Throne City – the constant dense traffic, difficult to navigate, negated most of the speed advantage that came of riding Companion-back. They had spent four days in the capital, where Vanyel did his best to ingratiate himself, across a stiff language barrier, to a headstrong young King who had never heard of him. The latter aspect had been a relief, actually, but it had still been exhausting and stressful, and he had hated every minute of it.

They weren’t likely to end up with a formal alliance; he wasn’t sure what the point would be, they shared no borders and Jkatha had no particular reason to care about Valdemar; but at least he had a few friendly contacts.

All of it had been useful experience for Dara. In fact, she was the one who had picked up the most useful pieces so far. She had gone down to the taproom every night, in every inn they had frequented, and spent her evenings mastering the language and, he suspected, trying to seduce the occasional attractive mercenary – she hadn’t always come back to their room. It seemed fine to Vanyel. She had handed over several tokens that could be redeemed for discounts with specific mercenary companies, which might be valuable at some point.

More importantly, she had befriended a company mage, and he had given her a letter of introduction for the school where he had trained. Vanyel wasn’t sure how Dara had finagled that, given that she wasn’t mage-gifted, and from what he knew, the various schools of mage-craft tended to be very secretive.

The place was called ‘White Winds’, and unfortunately it was already behind them, in Rethwellan. Maybe they could swing by on the return journey.

It had occurred to Vanyel that, really, someone ought to have investigated other schools of mage-craft years ago. One could make the argument that there hadn’t been time, that there was always more pressing work to do than an open-ended journey into foreign lands – but if someone had made the time for it a decade ago, they might have been in a much better position now.

Leareth was no fool, and had probably wrangled his way into every mage-school he could find, at some point in one of his ‘lives’. Maybe he hadn’t successfully gained entry to all of them, if they had strong admission requirements, but Vanyel had to assume he had.

“Vanyel?” Dara’s voice scattered the threads of his thoughts. “Are you all right?”

“Fine. Just thinking.”

“Mmm.” She tugged the cotton scarf she had bought at a market-stand in Throne City, adjusting it so it properly shaded her eyes. They had both learned the hard way to keep their faces covered after a few bad sunburns. Dara weathered it better – her complexion was nearly one solid freckle, now. Vanyel only turned a vibrant pink, and then peeled.

It had gotten drier as they veered south and west from Throne City, catching a ride on a fishing-boat fifty miles down the Anderine River – which Vanyel preferred not to remember, he had been abysmally seasick the entire time and Dara’s cheerful nonchalance hadn’t helped at _all _– and then peeling off onto one of the minor trade roads. At first it had been a relief, after the steamy heat of Throne City, but lately he tended to wake up with cracked lips and aching sinuses.

They had been traveling downhill for the last two days, towards the plain that lay far below the rolling hills of Jkatha. According to their maps, the Dhorisha Plains were almost more of a sunken crater than a plain, lying beneath steep cliffs on the northern and western edges in particular. The border with Jkatha was gentler and more gradual.

All morning, the land had been flattening out,giving way to an endless horizon of rippling grass and sedge-bushes. They weren’t passing crops anymore, only the occasional fenced pasture.

Vanyel realized he was scowling, and forced his cheeks to relax. “We must be nearly there,” he said, trying to sound cheerful. “Should I get out the map again?”

“No need.” Dara was practically bouncing in Rolan’s saddle. “I think that might be it. Look.” She pointed ahead.

“Oh.” Vanyel, even knowing better, had been expecting a normal city, with something like a Palace rising against the horizon. Not the distant, flat smear of colours that seemed to float just above the surface of the Plains, dancing in the heat-shimmer.

_Kata'shin'a'in._

A place he had never expected to see with his own eyes. _Gods, I hope it’s worth the journey. _Involuntarily, he felt his hand creep up to his throat, touching the small talisman that hung from a leather cord. He had kept it with him day and night, paranoid about losing it; it was the only way he had to prove that he was truly a Wingbrother of k’Treva.

Even so, he expected he would have to do a lot of talking, to be allowed in – and there was some chance they would turn him away, and it would all be for nothing.

They kept moving, the Companions at a comfortable walking pace that nonetheless outpaced the steady stream of wagons, laden donkeys, and parties on foot. Somehow Vanyel hadn’t expected it to be this _busy_. He knew better, but he had been picturing somewhere like k’Treva, quiet and peaceful…

Abruptly, Dara stood up in her stirrups. “Vanyel, I know this place!”

“What do you mean?” The line of colour had thickened as they approached, breaking up first into a thousand dots, then into the angular silhouettes of tents. It almost seemed to curve around them now, like the lip of a bowl.

“I, just… I would swear I’ve been here before. But that’s impossible.” Dara sagged back into the saddle. A moment later, her head spun towards him. “Oh!”

“What?”

“In a dream.” Her eyes were wide. “It _was_ Foresight! Rolan thought so, but I wasn’t…” She trailed off, eyes distant.

Vanyel blinked. “You had a Foresight dream? When?”

“Oh. Right.” Dara looked apologetic. “The first time was in winter. Er, whenall the other things were happening. So I guess I didn’t tell you.” She gestured at the distant tents, shimmering in the heat. “I only saw this place in the second dream, that was the day of the spring festival. In the first dream I just saw the plains.”

“Hmm.” Vanyel tugged at the sleeves of his shirt, which were clinging damply to his body. He had long since stripped off his tunic and draped it over the pommel. “I suppose that makes sense,” he said finally. “You Saw that we would be traveling here.”

“It wasn’t only the plains,” Dara added suddenly. “In the first dream. There was something… I can’t describe it. Can I show you?”

Vanyel nodded, parting his shield under her Mindtouch, and let her pull him in close.

_– Like the stub of something once-beautiful and majestic –sunk into the earth – melted, silvery – _

“I don’t recognize it,” he admitted.

“I’ve dreamed of it twice.” Dara fiddled with the trailing edge of her scarf. “Maybe it’s important?”

“Maybe.” He tried to smile reassuringly, even though it hurt his sunburned cheeks. “We’ll keep an eye out for it.”

* * *

Dara’s eyes felt ready to pop right out of her head. There were so many things to look at; she felt like she needed eyes on the back of her head, and the sides as well. They had left behind the main bazaar, trade-goods laid out on tables and canvas tarps almost as far as the eye could see, and people kept shouting at her in trade-pidgin, trying to sell her bolts of fine cloth, or jewelry, or weapons, or medicines, or pottery jars, or perfumes, or any of a thousand other wares.

Now they seemed to be in the part of Kata’shin’a’in where people lived and stayed, temporarily at least. There were tents in every shape, size, and colour – if you could even call them ‘tents’, some of them were very elaborate, made to look like various animals. Dara had spotted something like a mountain-lion with a rug rolled out from its mouth like a tongue, and a man standing at the threshold shouting at passers-by to come in and have a bit of ale. Dara would have been sorely tempted, if they hadn’t been in a hurry.

Some of the tents were _moving _– Dara had thought she was hallucinating, when she first saw a canvas-and-poles structure shaped like a giant hawk with mantled wings, bobbing up and down through the crowd, raising a cloud of dust from the packed-dirt path. It had proved to be set on a sort of scaffolding, carried by four laughing young men.

There were people everywhere, talking and laughing and singing, dressed in the brightest, wildest colours she had ever seen as well. Most of them had the features she had come to recognize as Shin’a’in, but not all – clearly this place drew in foreign merchants from all around. Fragments of a dozen languages drifted over her. She had even heard a knot of people speaking Karsite.

There were horses everywhere, scores of them in scores of colours, led in strings, prancing about in fenced-off pens, or just milling around between the tents and stalls. No one seemed concerned that they would knock things over, and they actually seemed to obey a few spoken commands, moving out of the way when someone barked a Shin’a’in word at them. Well trained, and clearly more intelligent than your average horse in Valdemar. She could see why they were so prized.

She and Vanyel were getting a lot of stares. Two different horse-sellers had shouted to ask how much Rolan would cost. Dara thought it was hysterical. Rolan didn’t.

In some tents, people were playing music. There were a lot of drums involved, and some kind of loud stringed instrument she didn’t recognize, and groups singing raucously. Right now they must have been midway between two different such tents, and the distant strains of music were interweaving. Dara would have expected it to sound terrible, but oddly it didn’t.

Dara was enjoying herself a great deal, even if it was abysmally hot. _Maybe I should buy something else to wear. _One of those flowing lightweight robes looked like it would feel much less sticky than her new summer Whites, and they would stand out less.

Then again, Vanyel had seemed worried about how quickly they were spending the coin they had brought. They needed to save enough for the return journey.

Vanyel wasn’t enjoying this at all, Dara thought. He was hiding it well enough, but his face was taking on a pinched look. She really could have guessed that he wouldn’t much like the bustle and chaos.

Unfortunately, he was the one who had to take the lead, here. He spoke some Shin’a’in, which was apparently quite similar to the Tayledras language; Dara had been trying to learn it from him over the last few weeks, in preparation, but she was still far from fluent.

He had asked for directions several times – at least, she assumed that was what he was doing, he spoke too quickly for her to follow.

_:Vanyel?: _she sent. It was too loud for conversation, so they had both resorted to Mindspeech. _:Are we almost there?: _She wasn’t actually sure where ‘there’ was.

_:Should be: _His mindvoice was tense, underlaid by a buzzing exhaustion. _:Look for a stone building: _

_:I thought there weren’t any permanent buildings?:_

_:There aren’t many. Only a few at the center: _

Dara nodded, and stood up in the stirrups again, trying to get a better view.

_:I wish they had some kind of direction-marker: _she sent.

_:They do: _Vanyel pointed. _:See that pole with the yellow flag? The arrow at the base should be pointing toward the center of the city: _

Amidst all the eye-popping colours, Dara hadn’t even noticed it. _:Oh: _

_:I haven’t figured out the distance-markers yet: _Vanyel admitted. _:There’s some sort of system: _

Dara stroked Rolan’s neck. _:Do you know where we’re going?: _

_:No more than you do, Chosen: _

Rolan had seemed very distracted all morning. Dara wasn’t sure what he was thinking about, but whatever it was, he wasn’t telling her.

Things had felt a little awkward between them, ever since the incident with Need. Dara didn’t think she would ever forget the sheer misery of the next day, knowing that Rolan was angry and hurt, unsure if she could ever make it up. In hindsight, she probably had been overreacting. It had felt like something she could never recover from, like Rolan and Vanyel would never trust her again, like maybe she shouldn’t have been a Herald…

Her conversations with Vanyel had helped a great deal. As he had pointed out, he had made far worse and more costly mistakes during the Karsite war, and no one was claiming he didn’t deserve to be a Herald over it. _We push ourselves to our limits, _he had said, _and that means we’re going to make mistakes. _And he had quoted Seldasen at her – the full quote, not just the fragment she had heard a few times.

_We are only children, and there are no parents, not in all the world. We face adult problems, and burdens that are too heavy to bear, and we break. We fall down, and we pick ourselves up and keep going, because what else are we going to do, when there is a kingdom that we must protect? _

Dara was still having nightmares about it. The awful wet meaty thud as the man who had been a mage fell, head rolling away from his shoulders… Vanyel said that was normal. _Someone very wise once told me that nightmares are how our minds take what we’ve seen and learn to live with it, _he had said.

She wished she knew if the old man was all right.

Talking to Vanyel had helped, but trying to talk it through with Rolan had been frustrating in comparison. It felt like he didn’t _get _it. That she couldn’t just put Need away in her saddlebags and ignore the sword’s calls, because Need was pointing at real problems, and maybe no one but her could solve them.

After she had made Vanyel’s point to him, that she was a Herald, or at least training to be one, and Heralds were meant to protect people and that didn’t change just because they were outside Valdemar, Rolan had said he was proud of her, and agreed to accompany her on future Need-missions. Somehow Dara had the sense that he _still _didn’t get it, though – that in some way, he was only indulging her. Supporting her interests because it would be good for her training and would make her happy, not because he thought it was important in itself.

Dara didn’t want verbal pats on the head. She wanted…what? It was hard to put her finger on it. Something.

_:Oh!: _she sent. _:Vanyel, look: _

His eyes followed her gesture, towards the open space and the squat, dark grey shapes slowly swimming into view through the sea of tents.

_:That looks promising: _he agreed.

Dara frowned, shading her eye and trying to peer ahead. There were no more tents ahead, and it looked like there was much less foot traffic, too – the grass was mostly still intact past the line, where everywhere else it had been hammered down flat by the passage of a thousand feet, leaving only a few tufts here and there.

–A voice interrupted them. Not the trade-tongue, but the fluid syllables of the Shin’a’in language. Dara leaned in, trying to catch as many words as she could. Something about horses…

_:No horses past this point: _Vanyel translated for her. _:Interesting. Well, I suppose we walk the rest of the way: _

_:Is that all right with you, Rolan?: _Dara sent.

_:Of course, Chosen: _Her Companion sent a wash of affection, but his mindvoice was absent, still distracted. _:We can fend for ourselves: _

Vanyel was already slipping down from Yfandes’ saddle, staggering slightly as he landed. He addressed the man in Shin’a’in, with some kind of formal gesture.

Dara dismounted, her boots landing with a thud on the hard-packed dirt. She was very jealous of the sandals that the man speaking to Vanyel wore; her feet were very hot, slimy with sweat, and surely her boots were going to reek after this.

She unfastened the cover on her saddlebags and dug around for Need. If she was going to be separated from Rolan, she intended to have _some _way of defending herself.

Vanyel glanced over at her. _:They may not allow weapons: _

_:Oh. Right: _Dara sighed, and replaced the sword. It was probably silly of her, to worry about self-defence when she was with Vanyel. He didn’t need weapons; he _was _a weapon.

Somehow it had never occurred to her to wonder how that would feel from his side. Not pleasant, she guessed.

Dara still wasn’t sure how to feel about Need. Her attempt at a conversation with the magical sword had mostly failed – she had tried to draw out the sword’s opinions on ethics, and met with blank incomprehension. It seemed like at least Need understood that Dara was upset with her, though, and had made the connection that it was to do with her overly-brutal approach to killing the bandits, and with the old man. It was hard to know if the blade had learned from it, she hadn’t really tested that yet – there had been a few more incidents, but nothing nearly as extreme. Need had never tried to take over her limbs again, but she hadn’t needed to, Dara was no slouch in weapons-class and her own skill had sufficed.

At one point she had felt a definite tug to follow the main road onward from Throne City, heading southeast rather than west. Whatever Need was responding to, Dara had the sense that it was a long way off. She had told the sword firmly that no, they weren’t going to head off in completely the wrong direction, and Need had subsided. Dara still felt a little guilty about it.

_You don’t get to know_, Vanyel had said, when she mentioned it to him. _We can’t be everywhere at once, so we make tradeoffs, and we don’t get to know what might have been if we’d chosen the other way. _

That had actually made her feel a little better about it, unlikely Rolan’s blithe assurance that rescuing a stranger wasn’t her duty, and completing this mission for King Randale was.

_:Dara: _Vanyel sent. _:Come over here and introduce yourself: _

The young man wore very simple brown robes, none of the vibrant colours she had seen earlier. His features bore a resemblance to Vanyel’s friend Starwind, but a little rougher, less refined, and his skin had a darker golden-brown tone, contrasting sharply with his deep blue eyes. His hair was jet-black, braided tightly to his head.

He nodded to her, and made a complicated gesture with his arms. “Ke’valen shena Pretera'sedrin, Kal'enedral,” he said.

Dara blinked at him. “Herald Dara of Valdemar, Chosen by Rolan,” she said after a moment, and bowed simply.

The man regarded her for a long moment, and Dara felt like an insect being picked up and examined.

Finally, a smile split his face. “Welcome,” he said – Dara recognized that word clearly. “You have come a long long way.” He tilted his head a little to one side, regarding them. “Though, what good is seeing the wonders of the world, if one is too saddle-sore to enjoy them?”

Dara caught most of the words – he spoke slowly and carefully, maybe for her benefit. She didn’t understand why he burst into raucous laughter, though.

_:It’s a proverb: _Vanyel sent. _:The Shin’a’in have a proverb for every occasion: _

_:Oh: _Dara still didn’t understand why it was funny.

_:Don’t worry about it. Come on, let’s go in:_

* * *

_:Chosen?: _Yfandes’ mindtouch brushed his shields, tentative.

_:What?: _Vanyel parted his shields, letting her slip through; he hadn’t even consciously realized he was shielding her out. He tried not to, but even now, sometimes her presence grated, and sometimes he just forgot.

_:It’s nearly sunset. Where are you?:_

_:Oh, is it?: _He wouldn’t have been able to tell. After winding their way between dozens of permanent buildings, mostly stone but some of wood, catching whiffs of incense and overhearing snatches of muted conversation and sweeter, less raucous songs, they were in a tiny stone-walled room. The junior shaman had left them to seek out further instructions, and it was mercifully dim, cool, and quiet. Vanyel had almost forgotten was quiet was like. _:I’m waiting for them to decide what to do with me. It might be a while: _

_:We should make camp before dark: _Yfandes pointed out. _:Rolan and I found a spot that’s available. We just need someone to pay the fee for it, and pitch the tent of course: _A waft of concern. _:Shouldn’t you come back tomorrow, when you’re rested?:_

_:I’ve made it this far: _Vanyel pointed out. _:I’d like to at least arrange a meeting for tomorrow: _The last thing he wanted right now was to head out into the crowds again.

Yfandes chuckled. _:I would say it’s quieting down, but that’s a lie. I’m not sure this place ever sleeps: _

_:Except in winter, maybe: _The central stone structures would stay, but at the end of the summer trade-season, all of the tents and stalls would be packed up and carried away. Ke’valen shena Pretera'sedrin, of the Clan of the Grass-cat, had been friendly and talkative while he led them off to find one of the shamanic apprentices, not like Vanyel’s image of a Swordsworn at all. They had learned that this was only the beginning of the trade season; many of the tents had only gone up in the last two weeks, and more were still trickling in and would be all summer, clans arriving and leaving at staggered intervals.

Ke’valen said there were only about ten thousand people in Kata’shin’a’in, less than the number that lived in Haven, but somehow it had felt as though every single one of them was shouting in his face.

_:Rolan suggests you send Dara: _Yfandes sent. _:You said it wasn’t clear if they would agree to talk to her, since she’s not a Wingsister:_

_:True: _Vanyel was tempted to keep her with him anyway, and insist. It was a lot easier to face the prospect of meeting yet another stranger with Dara’s calming presence beside him.

_:You might appreciate coming back to a tent already set up: _Yfandes sent.

That was also true. _:All right. I’ll send Dara back with our purse to meet you: _

Five minutes later, he was alone. Dara had seemed surprised, but not disappointed or hurt to be excluded. He had the sense that she was just as excited to go shopping for a meal as she would be to meet the senior shaman they had been waiting for.

It had taken Dara a couple of weeks to regain her natural cheer, after the incident with the village, but she was certainly enjoying herself here. _That makes one of us. _Vanyel was trying not to find it obnoxious; it wasn’t like she was having fun _at _him. Let her amuse herself; with Rolan there, she couldn’t get into any real trouble.

Closing his eyes, Vanyel leaned back on the stone bench, resting his cheek against the wall. He couldn’t sleep yet, but if he could close his aching eyes, just for a moment…

“Vanyel shena k’Treva?” A female voice, husky, jolted him out of a doze.

It felt very strange to be addressed that way. Vanyel’s eyes twitched open, and he quickly sat up, trying to look more awake than he felt. “Shaman?”

The woman shook her head. “No. Not exactly. I am Karna shena Tale'sedrin. Kal’enedral.”

Vanyel blinked, confused. She wore neither the black of a Swordsworn on blood-feud, or the more common brown; her robes were a deep, velvety midnight-blue. It was hard to guess her age; like Savil, her face was more weathered than lined, and her black hair bore only a few streaks of grey.

She sat on the bench opposite him, and fixed her deep-set blue gaze on him. “You have traveled a long way. And I think you are not of k’Treva, or not so simple.” Her eyes flicked down to survey his Whites, still fairly white despite all the dust, then back to his face, and her eyebrows rose. “Herald of Valdemar.”

“You know of Heralds?” he said, cautiously. The young junior shaman they had spoken to hadn’t had any idea; listening to Dara trying to explain it had been amusing.

The woman dipped her head. “I know of many things.”

_I wish you would stop being so mysterious. _Everyone had been like that, and it was wearing on him.

“You request to share of our knowledge,” the woman said. “This has not been asked in my lifetime. You say you belong to clan k’Treva, yet you are not Tale’edras. A strange thing. Many strange things, here.”

“It’s complicated.” Vanyel reached for the leather thong at his throat. He spent a moment searching for the right words – it had been a long time since he had last spoken in the Shin’a’in language, and he was rusty. “I was made a Wingbrother many years ago; I have proof. Do you recognize this?”

“Let me see it.” Karna held out a hand.

Reluctantly, Vanyel lifted the leather band over his head, and laid the talisman in her palm. Frowning, she looked at it for a long time.

“I see,” she said finally. Her voice changed; there was was something rote in it. “Tell me, Vanyel, what is the purpose of the third key on the set-spell of a Heartstone sanctum?”

For a moment he just stared at her. “What?”

She said nothing, only waited.

_It’s a test. _He took a deep breath, and opened his mouth to answer.

Afterward, she gave no sign of either satisfaction or disappointment, only asked him another question that was even more technical. Vanyel answered, even though he was hopelessly confused. _I thought the Shin’a’in forbade magic. _

Cautiously, he unshielded a tiny amount, just enough to open and reach with his mage-sight. And…yes. Hard to know without going in closer, which would be obvious to her, but her aura had the characteristic feel of the mage-gifted.

The junior shaman who had spoken to them had appeared to have an active mage-gift as well. Vanyel hadn’t been able to think of a tactful way to ask about that, without revealing more than he wanted to about himself. As far as he knew, it was a massive faux pas to even use mage-sight here.

There wasn’t much magic around. Oh, he had sensed a few enchanted artifacts, mostly worn or carried by foreign merchants visiting for trade, and there were plenty more for sale in the bazaar on the outskirts. But there were no nodes nearby of any significant power, and even the leylines were muted, buried deep. _I hope I don’t end up in a fight here. _He didn’t like the feeling of helplessness.

“Very good,” she said finally, and there was the faintest hint of a smile around her eyes. “I believe you are what you claim to be. Now. What is it you seek to know, and why?”

It was the moment he had been anxiously waiting on for weeks. _Here goes nothing. _

“I don’t know exactly what we’re looking for,” he admitted. “I came at the request of our King, and the advice of Moondance, Healing-Adept to k’Treva.” Which surely didn’t mean anything to Karna, even if she knew a suspicious amount about Tayledras magical lore – k’Treva was over a thousand miles away.

Vanyel hadn’t realized until he actually looked at their maps, tacking three of them together for Valdemar itself, Rethwellan, and Jkatha, just how enormous the region that they called the ‘Pelagirs’ was. They bordered on the entire northwest side of Valdemar, continued on the southern side of Lake Evendim, the western front of Rethwellan, and edged around Jkatha as well.

And most of Valdemar had once been Pelagirs, home only to dangerous magic and the Hawkbrothers who tamed it. When King Valdemar had claimed Haven, eight centuries ago, it had been on the very western edge of the inhabitable lands, the furthest he could flee from an unfriendly Empire. Valdemar had expanded gradually to the west, as new farmland opened up; Rethwellan and Jkatha must have been doing the same. The eastern shore of Lake Evendim, newly a part of Valdemar, might only have been inhabited for two hundred years, and even the intrepid fishing-clans that traveled its waters didn’t dare set down on the northern shore.

Strange, to think that the face of the world had been gradually shifting over hundreds, even thousands of years, new kingdoms springing up like flowers, and Leareth must have witnessed all of it.

The woman who wasn’t a shaman cleared her throat.

“Sorry.” Vanyel forced his eyes to re-focus on her. “My Kingdom is facing a threat from the north. It may not concern your people yet, given the distance, but if we don’t address it now, it will. Information on the events that led up to the Cataclysm might help us a great deal in countering this danger. I know that you keep your historical records here – and that they are the greatest of secrets, and to share them with an outsider is unprecedented. We need to ask that favour anyway.”

Keep it simple, reveal nothing more than he had to. Vanyel had rehearsed the opening dozens of times, and the answers he would give to various questions; Moondance had thought it possible that the Shin’a’in elders who guarded the memory tapestry would want a full explanation before they we were willing to share that knowledge with an outsider. Randi had consented to that, reluctantly. It was a risk, one that was hard to weigh, but they desperately needed the information.

To his surprise, Karna asked no questions, only looked at him for a long time, as though trying to read his entire life through his eyes. He could tell that she wasn’t a Thoughtsenser. It was still unnerving.

“I had wondered,” the woman said finally, cryptically. She stood up. “Vanyel, I cannot give an answer now. I must have time to think on your request. Come back on the morrow, and we will speak again.”

It was an abrupt dismissal. Vanyel stood as well, not sure whether to be relieved or disappointed. He bowed formally to her. “Thank you for your time today, Karna shena Tale'sedrin.”

Walking out into the fading light, torches and fires appearing in the distance, he felt a wave of loneliness. _I’ve never been so far from home. _The strangeness of this place only made it worse.

_:’Fandes?: _he sent, half desperately; all of a sudden he missed her sharply. Once, he had thought that wherever she was, was a little bit home. He didn’t know if he ought to feel that way anymore, or if it was too much weight to put on one bond – but he needed her there.

_:It’s all right, Chosen: _Love and reassurance. _:I’m coming:_

* * *

Savil stood with her arms clasped behind her back, her face carefully controlled. _Gods, I wish I had Kellan for this. _She was in the central, largest Work Room – oh, and that place held memories – and the shields blocked her Companion along with everything else.

Eight faces stared back at her, expressions unreadable. Half the mages left in Qorthes, the capital of Baires, now co-opted by Valdemar. Savil didn’t have the faintest idea what to do with them.

For one, none of them had been military, or even part of the government at all. It seemed the official mage-hierarchy had had no interest in accepting non-Mavelans below Adept potential, but their tiny homeland had used mage-craft liberally for all sorts of purposes, and it had been possible for a Master-level mage working independently to make a comfortable living. Two had specialized in weather-magic, two had owned a workshop together and produced enchanted artifacts for sale, one had been the ‘house mage’ for a minor but very wealthy highborn family, two had been mercenary-guards who rented their services to merchant caravans, and the last woman had specialized in laying shields for security on the dwellings of high-ranking nobles.

It seemed strange to her – mages working independently like shopkeepers, rather than under the supervision of the crown – but Kilchas had noted that it might actually be the more common setup in other kingdoms.

In short, they were a motley and undisciplined bunch, even years after they had been taken in under Tashir’s new administration – then again, all he had really done was offered them positions with a stipend higher than their previous earnings, and let them go on doing exactly what they had before, keeping the basics of a city running. Raised in Lineas, where they abhorred magic, _he _certainly hadn’t had any idea how to manage their task list.

None had any training in concert work; that, along with their lower status, was why they had been excluded from the Mavelan meld that had fueled Vedric’s attack. Which hadn’t just contained the Mavelan’s blood relatives – it had taken in every Adept-strength mage in the entire kingdom, over a hundred of them.

_I wish I knew how he did it. _However unethical the purpose, it had been an incredibly feat of concert-work. Even Starwind had been impressed, when she recounted what they thought must have happened.

Unfortunately, none of the group in front of her would be able to tell her anything.

_Don’t make them wait all day, _she reminded herself. “Thank you for coming. Keiran tells me that you’re settled in now.” They had been drilling under Lissa, of all people – well, her niece did have more experience of working with mages than most, and she was available.

It hadn’t been easy to impose military discipline, Lissa had complained to her. This particularly group had been selected because Melody had judged they were the most comfortable with Heralds and would be the least unhappy to be drafted, but they hadn’t exactly volunteered of their own free will, and they would be no one’s first picks for combat positions. The two crafts-mages who owned a workshop were both over fifty. Four of the others were married; three had young children, uprooted and dragged to Haven, now studying at the free places they’d been offered in the new Collegium. A weak attempt to sweeten the deal for them.

None of them seemed very happy about going back to ‘school’ as adults, though she hoped they would give her a little less trouble than Arkady. It was occurring to her that a better use of them might be to let them go on practicing their specialties – but even so, they needed to do it under the King’s purview, and she had to know their abilities.

“We’re going to be practicing concert magic today,” Savil said calmly, keeping her worries to herself. “None of you are incredibly powerful on your own, but together, you’ll make quite an impressive force.” A pause. “Don’t worry. I’m going to be dispelling any Web-alarms, which means the _vrondi _won’t be swarming you this time.”

They still didn’t know how many mages, dogged by the newly-watching _vrondi _every time they used their Gifts, had fled Baires for less troublesome lands in the chaotic time after the annexation. Tashir hadn’t been able to manage a census for almost a year.These were the folk who had been most willing to stay and endure.

Savil thought she and Sandra had almost solved the design for their proposed talisman, that would tie a non-Herald into the Web, not deeply enough for them to draw on its energy, but enough that the vrondi could check and call off alarms. A bonus was that the talismans offered a way to track the mages’ activities, at least as long as they were wearing them. Savil wasn’t planning to emphasize that part, and she felt a little uncomfortable about it, but it was reassuring as well. And, after all, every single Herald was constantly being ‘tracked’ by their Companions.

Carefully blank faces stared back at her, unreacting. Resigned.

“First.” She knelt and lifted the canvas that covered a patch of floor, exposing her two tiny Gate-thresholds, set in disks of stone and almost touching. “I’m told none of you have experience with Gates. Well, we’re going to learn.”

* * *

The sun was peeking over the horizon, the sky a bottomless bowl of pale blue, stained only by the occasional column of smoke from a cook-fire. Vanyel stood outside the tent, enjoying the air that was still cool, and the silence. It wasn’t complete – off in the distance, someone was _still _playing drums, they had been going all goddamned night – but the strange city was almost peaceful.

_:’Fandes?: _he sent.

_:Chosen: _Her light swept into his mind, and he started to flinch, and made himself relax into it. _:Did you sleep well? It’s awfully early: _

_:I slept fine: _He stretched, watching the horizon.

The night before, he had noticed Dara’s hopeful glances at one of the bigger nearby tents, where people had been dancing by torchlight to a drumbeat, and given her permission to spend her evening there if she wanted. He had drifted around for a while, not really talking to anyone, and ended up watching a musician outside a different tent who played a flute. It had reminded Vanyel of his wooden Tayledras flute, a gift from Moondance, probably packed away somewhere in his rooms back in Haven.

It had been over a week since he last unpacked his own lute. Vanyel was glad he had decided to bring it, even if it was extra weight and presented an appealing target for thieves. It was hard to relax, this far from home, but music helped.

_:Where are you?: _he sent. _:Karna didn’t give me a time, but probably this is too early, so I thought maybe I would go find some breakfast: _He still had provisions in the tent, but he was very tired of travel-bread and jerky.

_:I found an open pasture: _Yfandes sent, along with a flashed image and direction. _:Maybe you could buy some grain for us, though? The grass isn’t very filling: _

_:Of course: _Vanyel smirked to himself. _:Has anyone tried to buy you?: _

_:No, but this one stallion keeps trying to mate. I’m getting rather tired of it: _A pause. _:Why don’t you go to the Jor'ethan clan tent? They’re selling breakfast. Ask for the chava, I think you might like it:_

She sent another image; this time, it must have been a memory. A huge structure, as tall as ten men, dyed canvas stretched over hoops and struts to form the shape of a – right. Clan of the Bear. It made sense. For some definition of ‘sense’. _:I can’t believe this place: _

_:You should see it at night: _Yfandes’ mindvoice leaked an almost childlike delight. _:They put torches inside the bear’s eyes, and lanterns on the teeth, and its mouth opens and closes on pulleys: _A pause. _:You really ought to see the For'a'hier clan tent as well. Clan of the Firefalcon, apparently they split off from Tale’sedrin originally. They’re smaller, but they have amazing fire-dancers: _

_:Mmm: _If he was honest with himself, her enthusiasm was more tiring than pleasant.

_:I’m sorry, Chosen: _Contrition, and affection. _:I know it’s been a long journey and you’re tired. Listen – everything gets so dusty here, I could really use a good rub-down. Meet me back at the tent once you’ve found something to eat?:_

A peace offering; she knew it would be as soothing for him as it was for her. Vanyel had felt the tension building between them again, straining the fragile trust they had managed to rebuild. He had thought things were better, before, but fatigue made it harder to fight the parts of himself that sometimes still wanted to flinch away and hide. Yfandes forgave him for his avoidance, but it galled her – and it wasn’t fair, this journey wasn’t easy for her either.

He should have asked how things were going with Rolan, but he found that he didn’t especially want to know, and it was easier to avoid the topic. Yfandes would bring it up if she needed an ear, surely.

_:All right: _he sent, and forced himself to move.

A candlemark later, he was draining the last dregs of his second cup of chava, standing with one hand on Yfandes’ thoroughly-combed mane. _:Yfandes, this is wonderful: _The drink had a strange, bitter flavour that he hadn’t liked on the first few sips, even with the honey added to sweeten it, but it had grown on him.

He was surprisingly cheerful. The sun was properly up now, the air was quickly growing hot, and the relentless noise was creeping back in – already three different stall-owners had adamantly tried to sell him muscle-liniment, boots, and handkerchiefs respectively – but he felt much less daunted than the day before.

_:It’s a mild stimulant: _Yfandes sent. _:I figured it might help your mood: _

Now that he thought about it, he barely felt tired at all. _:You figured right: _He felt ready to face anything, up to and including a strangely intimidating old Swordsworn in mysterious blue robes. _:Ask Rolan if Dara’s awake?:_

_:She isn’t: _A mental snicker. _:Rolan says she was up rather late last night. She didn’t wake you when she came in?:_

_:Not that I remember: _Dara could be very quiet when she chose, Vanyel had learned, and she was considerate about his sleep. _:Well, pass on to her that I’ve gone back to the Old City: _He used the Shin’a’in term for the cluster of permanent buildings – not all of which were inhabited by Shin’a’in, he had learned the day before. There was an inn there, open to outlander merchants. Tempting, but too pricey to justify. _:What’s Rolan doing?:_

_:Exploring. And showing off: _Yfandes tossed her head as though flicking away flies, her mindvoice irritated. _:You would almost think he likes it when their mares try to flirt with him: _

_:…Horses flirt?:_ Vanyel had never thought to imagine it.

_:I mean, not like people, obviously. It’s not with words, but they have their ways of showing interest: _Amusement._ :Shin’a’in breeds are very intelligent. They’re more like dogs than ordinary horses, in some ways. Sociable. I can’t have a conversation with them, of course, but they’re not so bad to spend time with: _

That was a bizarre thought.

_:Go: _Yfandes sent, nudging at his shoulder. _:I’ll be all right. And I’ll keep an eye on Dara: _

Vanyel glanced back one more time at their tent, looking sad and bedraggled and very small compared to its surroundings, then turned to Yfandes, leaning his forehead against hers for a moment. He closed his eyes. _:I love you: _

_:I love you too, Chosen: _

“Herald Vanyel, Wingbrother to k’Treva,” Karna said, nodding to him. “Good morning. I was not sure if you were to return.” She had come out to meet him just inside the chalk circle that marked the inner, permanent core of Kata’shin’a’in. A cluster of stone buildings, none more than a single storey high, in total the size of a small village.

_I’ve come all this way, it would be dumb not to. _Vanyel didn’t say that out loud, only smiled politely. It was still weird, being addressed based on his status with the Tayledras and not his position as a Herald, even if it made sense that the former was the thing that mattered here.

“Karna. I am grateful to you for the invitation,” he said, speaking loudly enough to be heard over the dull roar of a thousand conversations behind them. He glanced sideways at her companion. He was a vigorous-looking man in his middle years, his iron-grey hair swept back from a high brow into a long braid that hung down his back. He wore the usual loose garments, in light material, though the colours were less vibrant than Vanyel had otherwise seen, mostly beige and cream embroidered with hints of brighter colours. He wore a simple headdress, with two small deer antlers.

Vanyel recognized _that _identifier. He bowed. “Shaman.”

“I am Tre’haren shena Vuy she'edras,” the man said. _Clan of the Wolf, _Vanyel translated mentally – at least he knew that much. “Senior shaman to Kata’shin’a’in. Come. We must speak.”

That seemed promising, at least. Vanyel nodded, and followed him through the open archway, once more into the stone-guarded dimness. Again, it felt a little like slipping into a different world. The constant cacophony from outside was no longer audible at all.

Which didn’t make sense; even stone couldn’t do that, not to mention there wasn’t a real door. Vanyel must have been too tired to question it, the day before, but when he tentatively reached out with his Othersenses – yes, that confirmed it. There was magical shielding on the stone walls. It felt very, very old.

...And he felt it as his aura brushed against the shaman’s, the moment of recognition that came when one mage met another. That made _three _mage-gifted, that he had met so far.

A shaman had traveled as far as k’Treva, once. Vanyel hadn’t actually been paying much attention at the time, it had been during his initial training. He couldn’t remember if the man had been there to talk to the Tayledras mages in particular.

_There’s something here I don’t understand. _Maybe he should have pressed Moondance harder for answers.

The shaman settled onto a stone bench, and gestured for Vanyel to sit as well.

“I have been expecting you,” he said.

For a moment, all Vanyel could do was stare. “What?” he said finally. “I don’t…” He trailed off. _Even I didn’t know I was coming until two months ago! _

“Well. Perhaps not you in particular.” The man smiled thinly. “Though if it were to be any Herald of Valdemar… I have heard your name, in song.”

_Oh, gods. _Vanyel managed not to cover his face with his hands, but he could feel his cheeks growing hot. He thought of asking which song, and decided he would prefer not to know.

“In any case. I did not know it would come of Valdemar. Nothing so specific.” The shaman shook his head. “It is much to explain, and not all of it what I yet feel ready to share. I must think on what I can say, now.”

Vanyel nodded, and waited, trying to show no sign of the impatience he felt.

Finally, the shaman clasped his hands together in front of him. “You must know something of our people, since you are here. Do you know the meaning, that Karna wears blue?”

“No,” Vanyel admitted. “She told me that she was Kal’enedral, but I’ve only ever seen them wear brown or black.”

“There is more than one kind of Kal’enedral. You known that most are sworn to the Goddess in her aspect as Warrior, and that they are also priests and priestesses to Kal’anel, though it is rare they serve that role.” He used the Shin’a’in word for the Star-Eyed. “We shamans have greater numbers.”

No, Vanyel hadn’t known the second part. He tried not to show his surprise.

“Karna was once training as a shaman,” the man went on, his voice slipping into the faintly singsong tones of someone telling a story. “We were apprentices together, in fact, until she was called by the Goddess. She is sworn to the Warrior, as are all Kal’enedral, and also to the Crone, as I am.” A pause. “They are called Scrollsworn. Who guard our memories.”

Oh. “Scrollsworn,” Vanyel repeated, trying out the unfamiliar Shin’a’in word on his tongue. He was feeling much steadier in the language, after a day of hearing it spoken all around him; words were coming more easily now.

The shaman inclined his head. “You are a mage. I am sure you notice that I am also, and so is Karna. I ask you, what do you know of our magic?”

Vanyel blinked. “What I _thought_ I knew, was that you didn’t use it. The stories say you gave up all magic after the Mage Wars.” He looked around. “It seems like maybe it’s a little more complicated than that.”

“You are observant.” An ironic smile. “Mage-craft is forsworn to our people, for all time. Did you ever wonder, what it is that becomes those of our people who are born with the Gift?”

“No.” But he should have. There was something he vaguely remembered Starwind saying, that he hadn’t really been curious about at the time. “I would have thought, maybe they go join the Tay – er, Tale’edras?” He tried to pronounce the word with the correct Shin’a’in emphasis.

A fragment of memory, drifting by. _I heard Leareth pronounce it that way, once. _Leareth, whose name came from the Kaled’a’in language – the people who, if the Tayledras oral history was accurate, had worshipped the Star-Eyed Goddess, and been predecessors of both Tayledras and Shin’a’in.

_I guess I’m about to find out if that’s true. _He hoped, anyway – it seemed far from certain that the shaman was going to agree to to show him anything, Wingbrother of k’Treva or not.

“That is one path. Another, for those who wish to live ordinary lives, is to close away the touch of the Gift. The third path is to become a shaman. Not all of our shamans are mage-gifted, it is not a requirement, but many are.”

That…made a lot of sense, actually, even if it hadn’t been mentioned in any tale or song he knew.

“We do not tell the world of this,” the shaman acknowledged, “nor do we use it to fight, except in the direst of times. It is a Gift from our Goddess, that we may serve her, and that is the purpose for which we use it and nothing else.” 

His voice had the same quiet intensity that Karis’ did, when she spoke of Vkandis. Vanyel managed to hide the discomfort from his face. _No, I don’t trust people who serve gods unquestioningly. _

“Do you know,” the shaman said, “of leshy’a Kal’enedral?”

No, but he recognized the root of the word. _Spirit Swordsworn? _It didn’t make sense, and he just shook his head.

“Few outsiders do.” Tre’haren glanced over, catching Karna’s eye, and they shared some kind of significant look.

_Damn it, you just enjoy being enigmatic. _Vanyel was trying to be patient, but he was getting very tired of it.

“I think,” the shaman said, slowly and with emphasis, “that perhaps it is time you were to meet one.”

_What? _

Tre’haren placed his hands on his knees, and rose to his feet. “You may go. Come back tonight, after the moon has risen.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For the curious: yes, Kata'shin'a'in is based on Burning Man. Yes, Van hates it there. He would also hate actual Burning Man. Fortunately, Dara is around to have a blast.


	9. Chapter Nine

_I’m not looking forward to this. _

Vanyel had spent most of the day wandering about the city, trying to get his bearings, which felt nearly impossible in a place with no permanent landmarks and thus no particularly accurate maps. Apparently the layout was different every year, and he was supposed to just memorize the system of distance and direction-markers.

Despite the unsettling conversation with the shaman, he had been in a cheerful enough mood until halfway through the afternoon, when the heat and crowds started to catch up with him, and the loneliness and distance. He missed Savil, and Shavri, and Jisa – and Melody, a little to his surprise.

He had retreated to their tent and laid a sound-barrier on it, and a reverse weather-barrier to cool the air, hoping that wasn’t breaking any injunction against magic use. Dara had showed up at sunset, disheveled and sweaty and grinning from ear to ear, carrying a basket that proved to be full of hot buns stuffed with sausage. Vanyel had let her chatter on about her day for half a candlemark, recounting all the various people she had met. She had learned a great deal about the various trade relations in the region, most of which wasn’t useful to their current purpose, but maybe some of it would prove to be.

He was worried about their coin-purse, which was starting to feel awfully light. It had never been a problem in Valdemar, where Waystations were kept stocked with foodstuffs and a wandering Herald could almost always find a household eager to put them up for a night, even among the most remote smallholdings. Even in Rethwellan, if he had run low on funds he could have written out promissory notes to be redeemed at any Border guard-post. They knew a Herald could be trusted.

Jkatha was different; it had no kind of treaty or reciprocal agreement with Valdemar, and living in Kata’shin’a’in was _expensive. _There was a fee for their tent-plot, and a fee to draw water from one of the wells, and they needed to buy grain for Rolan and Yfandes as well as provisions for themselves. A few days was fine, but if they stayed much longer, they were going to be cutting into the gold and silver he had set aside for the return journey.

He could worry about it later.

Vanyel had warned Dara he might be back late, and headed off to meet the shaman as the first stars began appearing in the sky. Now he was back in the Kata’shin’a’in Old City, but not indoors – they sat on a stone bench between two adjoining blocks, under the stars.

Tre’haren had offered no more explanation of what, exactly, they were about to do, only pulled Vanyel into the alleyway and gestured for him to sit. The moon, still low on the horizon and not quite full, cast slanting light into a distorted square on the near wall.

The air was still warm, Vanyel could feel the residual heat radiating from the stone walls that had baked all day in the desert sun, but the temperature was dropping rapidly.

“It is easiest to do this by moonlight,” the shaman said. “Best to be comfortable. You are ready?”

_Ready for what? _Vanyel kept the question to himself, and only nodded.

“Karna?” The man turned to nod at her. “You may lead.” He glanced at Vanyel. “Ordinarily, an outlander cannot do this. In special circumstances such as these, we will show you the way.”

_Where are we going? _Vanyel bit his tongue, and waited.

“May I?” The Kal’enedral held out her hand.

Vanyel hesitated, but only for a moment, before placing his palm in hers.

There was a strange twisting motion, not of his body, but of everything else. For a moment, Vanyel felt like he was falling.

–And he stood on a path made of moonbeams, surrounded by silvery mist, the dusty light of nebulas shining down on him.

His breath caught. _Oh, no. _Vanyel glanced around wildly, and realized that the two Shin’a’in were there as well. They looked different – younger, he thought, and their garments had the same unfinished look he remembered from the Shadow-Lover’s realm.

“Where are we?” he said. His voice seemed to fall into the mist, muted. “I’ve been here before.”

Two pairs of blue eyes that looked black in the dusky light stared at him. Karna seemed lost for words; Tre’haren, oddly, didn’t seem especially surprised, only gave Vanyel a knowing look.

“We are on the Moonpaths,” Karna said finally. “You should not have been able to come here.”

“It wasn’t really on purpose.” Vanyel tried not to squirm. The place was beautiful, and he felt distant, almost peaceful, but he didn’t trust it.

Hadn’t Moondance said something to him, once? _As real a place as any, in the spirit world. The shamans of the Shin’a’in learn to leave their bodies and to travel there. _He had entirely forgotten that conversation until now, and he should have remembered – it was extremely relevant. What was wrong with his mind?

The previous times, he had been very distracted, and he finally thought to try the obvious test. _:Yfandes?:_

Nothing. There was a heavy, sinking feeling in his gut. _I’m on my own. _

“I would like to know more of this,” Tre’haren said, “but now is not the time. Close your eyes.”

Reluctantly, Vanyel obeyed, suddenly all too aware that he was entirely at the mercy of two people he had just met and had no particular reason to trust. He wasn’t even sure if magic would work here, if he needed to defend himself against…something.

Silence. There was a strange sort of music in it, in the patterns of light that played on his closed eyelids.

“Verkal'enedral.”

The word was confusing – _white Swordsworn? – _and the woman’s voice that spoke it was strange, somehow muffled and echoey at the same time, as though it came from the bottom of a well. Vanyel’s eyes flew open.

Another figure had appeared on the path – a woman, he thought, slight of build, clad from head to toe in the black robes of a Ka’lenedral on blood-feud. Unlike any he had seen before, her face was veiled and hidden as well. She held herself like a fighter, though he couldn’t actually see any weapons – but, oddly, his mind didn’t want to find her threatening. There was something almost motherly about her. Comforting.

_I don’t trust you, _Vanyel reminded himself.

Not the Star-Eyed Goddess herself, this time, but there was an oddly luminous sheen to her garb, as though she was lit from behind by moonlight, and even though his Othersenses were flinging up nothing but noise, in this strange place, he knew that she wasn’t just another Swordsworn, greeting them in this strange meeting-place.

Vanyel found himself wanting to fall to his knees, but he resisted. _I won’t kneel for you. _Instead he bowed, formally, and then straightened his shoulders. Hold his chin high, like he had every right to be here. “I am Herald Vanyel, of Valdemar. To whom do I owe the pleasure?”

“I know what you are.” The woman stood with the same utter motionless that Leareth did, he thought. He wasn’t sure if she was breathing – or even human, or alive at all, but she didn’t feel as alien as the Star-Eyed Goddess. _Damn it, I wish I had asked Moondance more questions. _He hadn’t wanted to press, when it had clearly been a very difficult decision for k’Treva to direct them here at all, but he hated not knowing. _I feel so helpless. _

Keep it under control. “I figured,” Vanyel said, lightly. “What was the word that you called me?”

“It makes sense, does it not?” A dusty laugh. “You are sworn to a sacred duty, and a Guardian Spirit guides your way. You and the Kal’enedral have that much in common.”

Guardian spirit. She meant Yfandes, presumably. Vanyel felt like he was missing a piece, and he didn’t know how to fit the puzzle together without it.

The figure of the woman turned away from him to the others, and her voice dropped into a deeper register, and for a moment seemed to come from even further away. “Pawn he is and has been, pawn to what he is and will be, what the path that he sees, the game is in play and it moves as She wills…”

Vanyel blinked. _Why do I feel like I’ve heard that before? _It was deeply creepy.

A pause, and when she resumed, her voice was more normal. “And yet it is not so simple. There is more than one path, here, it seems, and more than one Power.”

_All information is worth having. _Vanyel found himself repeating the words to himself, in his mind – even though he wasn’t sure it was true, anymore. There was knowledge that might not be worth the risk or the price it bore.

Karna seemed taken aback. The shaman only watched in silence, smiling as though to himself, but the flicker of an eyelid gave away something that might have been surprise.

The woman who certainly wasn’t an ordinary Kal’enedral turned to face Vanyel again.

_Leshy’a Kal’enedral_, Tre’haren had said. Spirit Swordsworn. _Is that what she is, a spirit? _

“Outlander, why do you come here?”

Vanyel took a deep breath, fighting the strange vertigo that was creeping over him. He wished the faint halos of mist around them would stop _moving_.

“You know of Heralds,” he said, “so you must know of Valdemar. We face a threat to the north, and my King believes that learning more of your people’s history, concerning the time of the Mage Wars, will help us to survive it.” Start out as non-specific as he could, and go from there…

“No.” Even though her eyes lay in the shadow of her veil, he felt her gaze pierce him. “Your King’s orders are not what brings you.” She took a step forward, and Vanyel managed, barely, not to flinch back. “Tell me of your true reasons, Herald Vanyel of Valdemar. If you do not trust us, how do you expect that we may trust you?”

Which was a fair point. He closed his eyes. _Yfandes, I wish you were here with me. _“I’ve had a Foresight dream for sixteen years that I would fight a mage in the north, marching on our Kingdom with his army. His name is Leareth and he claims to be immortal, and can prove it. I believe he has been active since the Cataclysm, and was involved in it, somehow. Knowing what happened then would help us – help me – figure out what to do about him now.” He stopped for breath, and to think. “Moondance k’Treva sent me, if that means anything to you.” He hesitated, chewing his lip, trying to decide… Maybe there was no point in hiding it. “For what it’s worth, the Star-Eyed knows about this. I’ve, er, met her here. Twice.”

“I know.”

Silence. Even the shaman seemed lost for words.

“You have followed your path a long way indeed,” the woman said. “And there is further yet to go.” She inclined her head. “We will give what you have asked, _Verkal'enedral_. May you choose the right fork in your road.”

Vanyel blinked, and she was gone.

The silence stretched on.

“Well.” Tre’haren lifted a hand to rub his eyes. “Karna, it seems we have our answer.”

The Kal’enedral nodded curtly, and held out her hand to Vanyel again, not quite meeting his eyes.

…And Vanyel found himself sprawled on his back, aching from head to toe. His head throbbed urgently. _Where…? _

_:Chosen!: _

He groaned. _:’Fandes?: _

Someone was slapping lightly at his cheek. “Herald Vanyel!” Karna’s voice. “Are you well?”

“It is to be expected,” he heard the shaman’s voice say. “He is not practiced as we are.”

“Though it seems he has a talent for it,” the Scrollsworn said. “He took the step easily.”

_:Van, what happened?: _

Vanyel could barely manage to hold his end of the link. _:Tell you after… Send Dara?: _More than anything, he wanted Yfandes in the same room as him, but she wasn’t exactly going to fit.

_:Are you hurt?: _Rising concern.

_:I think I’m just drained: _It felt like backlash – no, more than that, it was the way he had felt when he woke in k’Treva after touching the Heartstone. An empty vessel, scraped raw.

_‘Lendel, ashke, I miss you–_

* * *

“Papa?” Jisa said uncertainly.

He set down the papers he had been holding, resting them on the blankets, and turned. “Oh. Sorry, pet, I didn’t hear you come in.” His voice sounded very distracted; he was thinking about something, and it wasn’t her.

“Are you busy?” It was time for her bedtime story, but she didn’t want to interrupt him if he was doing something important.

“No.” He frowned. “Well, yes, always, but I’m never too busy for you.”

That wasn’t true at _all. _He was almost always too busy for her, and it wasn’t fair, but Jisa didn’t find it particularly hurtful anymore. Papa was doing _good _things, she reminded herself whenever it bothered her. He was making Valdemar a better place to live for so many people – with the education system, and all of the other things she had heard him talk about. When she thought of it that way, it made her feel warm instead of cold inside.

“I don’t need you to read me a story yet,” she said, clambering up into the bed next to him. “Can I help you with your work?”

Papa only stared at her for a moment.

Jisa raised her chin. “I’m not a little girl anymore.”

“That’s true.” Papa ran a hand over his hair – it didn’t fluff up the way it had used to, when he did that, it was limp and flat. It was as though every day he looked older. The skin on the backs of his hands was loose, and there was a big bruise on his wrist from where he must have gently bumped into something.

_I hate it. _

“What are you thinking about?” she said, smiling brightly, even though part of her was feeling sad again. She could still be happy that he was here, now, and paying attention to her at least mostly.

“Hmm. Mostly how we’re going to set up schools in the north, once they finally decide to sign the treaty. It’s going to take some adjustments to get our system to work.”

Jisa cuddled up against him, leaning her head on his shoulder. He was all bony and didn’t make a very good pillow anymore, but she didn’t mind. “Why?”

“Two reasons. One, it sounds like hardly anyone up there can read or write. Makes it harder to persuade parents that it’s worthwhile to send their children to school. Two, they don’t have as many temples, so we can’t use them the same way.”

Jisa frowned. “People aren’t religious?”

“Oh, no, I wouldn’t say that. Plenty of people worship Kernos, or Astera – they just do it privately in their homes. Or they worship some local god neither of us has ever heard of.”

Jisa tried to think. “Maybe you could have the high priest of Kernos go build more temples there? And then people would go?” Surely they would be happy to have a nicer place to pray, with all of their neighbours. “Maybe they would start worshipping Kernos or Astera even if they hadn’t before, if there was a temple.” Beri said that was how it worked.

“Maybe. It’s likely to happen eventually, but most people don’t adapt quickly to change.” Papa’s voice had shifted Normally, he talked to her differently than he did with grownups, more slowly and simply, but now he sounded _exactly _like he did when he had a conversation with Uncle Van. Jisa liked it, she decided. “Besides,” he added, “building a temple is expensive. Usually they build a new temple when enough people ask for it, so they know they’ll get enough in tithes to cover the keep for the priest who runs it, if not the building-cost.”

That made sense. A temple that only a few people went to still needed a priest, and incense, and a garden, and all the other things that temples had – Jisa realized she didn’t really know what sorts of things you needed, and how much coin those things cost. “Papa,” she said, hesitantly, “could you give the high priest money, to build the temples? So it won’t be so bad if it takes a bit for people to start going to them?”

“I was thinking about that. Trouble is, I still have to get it through the Council. And they’ll ask why we’re spending our gold on that instead of the Guard, or,” he smiled slightly, “services closer to their own lands. Especially since the north will be paying graduated taxes at first. Not to mention, a few of them hate religion. Which is allowed, there’s no one true way, but it makes it awfully hard to wrestle them all onto the same page.”

Jisa had heard him complain about the Council enough at dinner to know he was right. “You have to pay for it anyway,” she pointed out. “If they’re a part of Valdemar, they have to have schools, it’s the Law. So if you don’t give it to the temples, you need to send other people out to build schools anyway–”

“Oh!” Papa’s eyes opened wide. “I hadn’t thought of that, pet! That _is _an option. We could set up places that aren’t temples to a particular god, and no one would feel excluded by it – not to mention, we wouldn’t have to subsidize building a chapel grand enough for Kernos. Refurbishing some old barns would do. Hmm, maybe we could combine it with the Healers’ stations, we’re looking at putting a few of them in the bigger towns. The only question is, where do we find teachers…”

There was a warm pink feeling in Jisa’s throat. She had given Papa an idea. Listening to him talk about it was even better than a storybook.

There were all sorts of ideas she could talk to Papa about, really. Ideas for how to make it so that no more orphans had to live on the streets, and maybe even for people to stop killing animals and eating them. That would be hard, she knew now that people were set in their ways and not everyone thought that animals mattered, but she could try.

* * *

“Be good, Arkady.” Natti pulled her grandson’s head down to kiss his hair – he submitted to this treatment without enthusiasm, but without protest – and then released him, stepping back. “Herald-Mage Savil – thank you.”

_Don’t thank me yet. _Savil nodded to the woman and tried to smile, then reached to pull the door of the Work Room shut.

She had been working with the boy once a week for four weeks, now, and she wasn’t sure they had made any progress at all. Arkady was so damned twitchy, and he still didn’t even know how to center and ground.

He had finally stayed still long enough for her to assess his Gift – his potential was about the same as Sandra’s, just shy of Adept. But without any of Sandra’s excellent innate control. If anything, it was a mercy that he couldn’t control his Gift enough to use it efficiently, much less draw on energy from outside himself. _He could hurt someone very badly that way. _

There had been an incident, early on. Randi had suggested that they place the boy with the Blues, the new merit-based Collegium – but even now, it was three-quarters highborn children from Haven. Spoiled brats, the lot of them, or at least that was Savil’s opinion.

They had not been particularly welcoming to a foreign boy who couldn’t even read or write in Valdemaran yet, and who was more than a little odd.

A couple of them had thought it would be funny to play the ‘bump him and make him drop his books’ game with such a juicy new target.

Kilchas had arrived in time to put out the fire before anyone was seriously hurt, and in Savil’s opinion, the boys had entirely deserved it. But it had ruffled feathers, and now Arkady wasn’t allowed back until he was ‘safe to be around children.’

She had tried to have a talk with the lad, and it was clear he thought he had done nothing wrong. No wonder he hadn’t been Chosen. _He’s a damned terror. _Kilchas and Sandra were both unimpressed by the plan to train him right here in Haven, potentially making him _more _dangerous rather than less, and even Randi was dubious that it was a good use of Savil’s time.

It might all be worth it, for a caseful of old books that could, conceivably, offer them the secret of permanent Gates. Unfortunately, they were in the language spoken in the Eastern Empire – it had some words and grammar in common with Hardornen, but Savil certainly couldn’t read it fluently, and so she needed to count on Natti to translate. Nattie, who didn’t have the slightest idea what the technical magic-terms meant. Her husband hadn’t been one to take work home with him, it seemed.

_Focus, _she reminded herself.

“Arkady,” she said. He still wouldn’t look her in the eye, but at least he was standing a little straighter, these days. “I have some good news.” She reached into the pocket of her tunic, and drew out a small quartz focus, hanging from a leather thong. “Would you put this on?”

He stared sullenly past her left shoulder, and didn’t answer.

“Arkady,” she said, as patiently as she could. “This is the talisman we’ve been working on for months. It ought to dispel the _vrondi _– they’re the air-elementals that start watching over your shoulder every time you use magic.” She could dispel them from watching him when they were working together, but only a second or two _after _they swarmed all over him, and she couldn’t really do anything the rest of the week.

He grunted under his breath and took a step forward, then froze.

“Here.” She held it out in the palm of her hand. “Touch it and play with it a little, first. It won’t hurt you.”

She waited for nearly a minute before the youngster’s hand darted out and snatched the dangling leather cord, yanking it to his chest before she could blink. He took two steps back, flattening himself against the stone wall, and examined the crystal between his palms.

_Wait. _She was almost itching with impatience, but she knew by now that she had to let him go at his own pace.

Finally, _finally_, Arkady seemed to decide that the item was safe. He lifted the thong over his head, letting the focus settle on his chest.

With her mage-sight open, Savil watched the shiver amongst the _vrondi_. Even now, a little crowd of them had been gathered around him – Arkady couldn’t shield properly, and leaked mage-energy at random even when he wasn’t using it deliberately.

Now, they bounced for a moment, as though relieved. Arkady held their attention for a few moments more, but then they were clearly bored, and started to drift away.

Arkady made a soft sound, almost a moan.

“There you go,” she said. “Now, try some magic for me? You can do lightning-hands, if you want.” It was the closest he had to a controlled technique, and of course it was offensive rather than defensive. Savil held out her own hands. “Go on. Come at me.”

The only time she had seen anything close to a smile on the boy’s face was when she let him ‘spar’ with her. He would try to reach out and slap her, he couldn’t actually aim levinbolts so much as hold the barely-controlled energy in his hands and flail at people, and she would dodge, tossing up barriers in his way and occasionally letting him land a hit, her shields harmlessly deflecting the sparks of power.

It was a ridiculous game, and she wouldn’t have let any other student start with that – it was an excellent way to form bad habits – but Arkady already _had _bad habits, baked in deep.

He hesitated, clearly not quite believing that the _vrondi _would continue to leave him alone, but then launched himself forwards.

She let him go for a minute or two, then deliberately failed to block a strike, her skin tingling as the clumsy levinbolt crackled off her shields.

Arkady stopped, an almost awed look in his eyes.

There were a few _vrondi _in the room, there usually were, but they weren’t looking at Arkady in particular. He was supposed to be there, and so held no interest for them.

“See?” Savil said. “It worked. Feels better, no?”

Arkady was staring past her, into the distance.

Then, to her utter surprise, he burst into tears, and dived forwards. Savil started to step out of the way – _is he going to attack me – _but he only flung his arms around her.

“Thank you thank you thank you–”

Savil stood awkwardly for a moment, unsure what to do and wishing desperately that she could reach Kellan for advice, and then sighed and reached to pat his back. “Hey, hey, it’s all right.”

* * *

_:We’d better call a stop: _Mama sent, squeezing Jisa’s hand. _:Did you See anything more this time?: _

Jisa blinked, slowly returning to the moment. She had been deep in trance, watching Stef through their shared Sight while he sang for Papa. Just for half a candlemark, this time; it wasn’t an audience or meeting, just the four of them in Mama’s rooms, and Mama wanted Stef to save his energy for helping Papa with important work, the times he couldn’t afford to be groggy from pain medicines.

Jisa thought that seemed wrong. Surely Papa deserved to be comfortable sometimes when he was just doing something for fun. Mama said that Stef’s Gift was a limited resource, until they could figure out how to imitate it, and that meant they had to prioritize.

Jisa was very, very motivated to help Mama figure out how an ordinary Healer could do the same thing Stef could. She thought Stef might be conflicted about it – it would make him less special, after all, even if it would mean he could have more free time.

_:A little bit: _Jisa sent, hopefully.

_:I think I did as well: _Mama sent, warmth in her mindvoice. _:This was a good idea. You’re right, it’s a lot harder to watch what he’s doing when I’m trying to pay attention to a meeting at the same time: _

Jisa had thought that was obvious.

“Stef,” Mama said out loud. “Stef, lad, you can stop now.”

He didn’t answer, only kept strumming gently at the lute, eyes closed, his expression peaceful.

There was something about the shape of his mind… Jisa couldn’t put her finger on it, except that it seemed familiar. Reluctantly, she folded away her Sight, the world sinking and flattening into ordinary shapes and colours. 

She slid down from her chair and went over to shake his shoulder. “Stef. Hey. We’re done.”

He blinked, eyes refocusing, like someone waking from a deep sleep. “What?”

“You can stop now.”

He lowered the lute to his lap, looking almost disappointed. It was as hard for him to stop using his Gift as it was for Jisa to stop using hers, she thought. Like putting away something shiny and beautiful, and turning back to a world that was just a little greyer and sadder without it.

“Thank you, Stefen,” Papa said, turning his head and smiling from the table. “That was wonderful.” He glanced at Mama, caught her eye, and from their faces Jisa knew they were Mindspeaking with each other. “Let’s go,” Papa agreed after a moment. “I’ll tell you about it in bed.”

Mama touched Jisa’s shoulder for a moment, smiling as well, and then stood up. “Stefen, lad, you’re welcome to stay here a while if you want.”

“Thank you, Healer Shavri.” As usual, Stef was almost painfully polite with her parents. “I’m glad I can help, Your Majesty.”

“Can you _please _stop calling me that?” Randi said, but there was a smile in his voice as Mama helped him to his feet. “Enjoy your evening, children. Don’t get up to any trouble.”

And then they were gone.

“You don’t have to stay,” Jisa said. She liked talking to Stef, but she didn’t want to pressure him, if he was tired or had homework.

“That’s all right. I wanted to talk to you.” Stef’s eyes were on her face, but he his hands were absently fiddling with his lute again. “Listen, you remember Lady Treesa?”

Jisa nodded. It wasn’t like she could have forgotten that dinner.

“Did you like her?” Stef’s face flashed one of those brief, brilliant smiles. “She likes you.”

Jisa thought about it for a moment. “Yes,” she decided. “She tries to be nice to people.” That wasn’t quite the thing she meant, but she couldn’t think of a better way to put it.

“I had tea with her yesterday,” Stef said. “I think she’s really lonely here.”

Oh. Jisa was surprised; somehow she hadn’t thought that was the sort of thing Stef would notice, or care about.

“I think she’s having trouble fitting in with the other lords’ wives,” Stef added. “I tried to give her advice about how the game works, here, so she can make friends, but – well, it’s hard, she’s so…earnest.”

“Oh?” Jisa leaned forward, propping her chin on her palm.

Stef gave her a very hopeful look. “I thought maybe you could go have tea with her sometimes? I think she might need a different kind of advice. Some kind of useful project to do – and that might help her be popular more than having the right kind of curtains.” He glanced down at the floor. “But only if you like talking to her.”

“I do like talking to her.” Jisa felt oddly flattered by the request. “What sort of useful project?”

“Oh, I don’t know.” Stef waved his hand vaguely. “She told me she used to take in fosterlings, from families who didn’t have very much money, to be her ladies-in-waiting, and she would make sure they learned how to read and write and got training so they could make a good living for themselves.” He set his lute on the table and pressed his hands together, stretching his wrists. “Her daughter-in-law took charge of that project at Forst Reach, and I think Lady Treesa would like to do something like that here, but she doesn’t know anyone.”

Jisa frowned, thinking. Really, she wished she could get Lady Treesa to help her convince other people not to eat dead animals, but she didn’t know if that was the kind of thing Stef was thinking about – maybe it would make the other ladies at Court think that she was annoying, rather than making her popular. “I’ll try to think of something.”

“You should have tea with her sometimes either way, if you would enjoy it,” Stef said. “I can hint to her that she should invite you.”

That seemed unnecessary. “I can just send her a note,” Jisa pointed out. “Or walk over sometime.”

Stef gave her an odd look, but nodded.

“How are your lessons going?” she said. Stef never talked about himself very much, but it seemed polite to ask.

“Oh, fine. Breda said she’s going to try to arrange it so I can graduate early.” He shrugged. “Probably not for another year or two though. Hardly anyone makes full Bard status before they’re eighteen, and I don’t think anyone’s ever done it before sixteen. I did start younger than most people, but I was behind on a lot of things as well. I couldn’t even read when I came to Haven.”

“Mmm.” Jisa tucked her legs up under her. “Why does she want you to finish early?”

“Politics. The other Bards think it’s odd that I’m performing for the King and I’m not even at Journeyman yet. Breda had to soothe some rumpled feathers.” Stef ran a hand through his hair, scraping it back from his face into a crest that collapsed a moment later. “She says she would almost wished I’d waited until I was older to tell anyone about my Gift, that it would save her the headaches.”

“I’m glad you told us now.”

Another room-lighting smile. “I’m glad as well. Even if it’s exhausting.”

“That’s the thing about having a Gift, isn’t it?” Jisa closed her eyes, remembering the words Uncle Van had said to her once. “If you’re the only one who can do something, then you _have _to. Because there are people out there who need you. That’s the promise that power makes for us.”

Stef’s nose wrinkled. “You sound like Medren.”

Jisa only smiled to herself. He might try to pretend he didn’t care, but she knew better. She knew he was proud of his Gifts, and it wasn’t just because they were a way to get ahead.

“I think it’s getting less tiring with practice,” Stef said after a moment.

“It’s like exercising a muscle. You get stronger by using it.” Which made it all the more unfair that Jisa so rarely got the chance to really push her Empathy. What if she needed to do something really important, someday, and she wasn’t strong enough because she hadn’t practiced it?

They were both silent for a moment.

“Jisa, I wanted to show you something,” Stef said finally. “It’s from my lessons with Katha. She was helping me figure out interesting ways I can use my Bardic Gift.”

“Oh!” Jisa felt a thrill of excitement. “Show me!”

* * *

“Vanyel, hey,” Dara prodded. “We’re here.”

He turned in Yfandes’ saddle, slowly, but it was a long moment before his eyes focused on her. He blinked, as though surprised to see their tent. “Oh. Thank you.”

“Can you get down?” Vanyel had seemed unsteady enough when she picked him up from the shaman that she was worried he would manage to fall and hurt himself. He had protested incoherently when she tried to belt him to the saddle, so she’d left it alone and just walked beside him all the way from the Old City, ready to catch him if he started to slide off.

“I’ll try.”

Yfandes knelt, helpfully, and Dara held out her hands. Vanyel managed to swing his leg over and dismount without falling over, and she took his elbow and guided him toward the tent.

It was very dark inside; they had been relying on Vanyel’s mage-lights, but he didn’t look in any kind of shape to provide one tonight. Dara lowered him to his bedroll, and then started looking in her saddlebags for a candle. Which wasn’t the most safe option, in a tent. Maybe she ought to look at some of those mesh-covered lanterns she had seen for sale in the bazaar…

She found her flint-and-steel, which again had seen scarcely any use on their journey, and managed to light a taper and then the candle. Dim flickering light glanced from the canvas walls.

“Vanyel?” she said. “Did they give you some sort of drug?”

“No – I don’t think so.” He shook his head, hard, as though trying to dissuade flies. “Took me to the Moonpaths. Spirit world. I don’t…”

“Shush, it’s all right. You don’t have to explain now.” She would ask Rolan if he knew anything about it. “No – don’t lie down just yet. You should have some food before you go to sleep.” Reminding Vanyel to eat enough on their journey had been a constant trial.

He raised his eyebrows. “You’re nagging.”

“Yes. Stay right there. I’ll see if I have any of the jerky left, and otherwise I’ll go to one of the stalls.” There would be places open all night – in fact, several of the nearby camps would probably give her food for free. Dara had been making friends as hard as she could.

There was in fact some of the dried travel-meat left in her saddlebags – gods, Dara hated the stuff. She gave Vanyel a hand-sized chunk. He stared blankly, like he had forgotten what to do with it.

“You chew on it,” she said, trying not to giggle.

“Know that. M’not _that _muddled.” He made a face at her. “Just seems like…a lot of work.”

Dara was digging deeper into her saddlebag. “I have some of the oats still, I could go to the public cook-fire and make you oat porridge.”

“Dara, you aren’t my mother.” Vanyel rolled his eyes. “Stop it.”

“No. Eating isn’t optional.” _:Rolan, can you make Yfandes tell him?:_

Rolan felt amused. _:Already done, Chosen: _

Dara was very, very curious about whatever had just happened. It didn’t seem like Vanyel was going to be able to tell her right now, though. _:Rolan? Do you know anything about the ‘Moonpaths’?:_

He hesitated before answering, and she caught a hint of that same reluctance, that meant he wasn’t sure she ought to know something. _:They are a way that mortals in the material plane can project their minds to the plane of spirit: _he sent.

_I have no idea what those words actually mean. _Dara frowned. _:Is it dangerous?: _

_:I believe it is safe enough if one has a guide, and stays on the paths: _A pause. _:It is very tiring, for those who are untrained. Likely this is just backlash: _

Dara had seen a lot of her fellow trainees push themselves into backlash, and done it herself a time or two – normally, people didn’t seem like they were drugged, or like they were still half in some other world.

Still, she did know what to do about a mage who had drained themselves. “I’ll get you some tea with honey,” she offered. “Maybe that will give you enough energy to eat your food.” _:Rolan, if he’s not better by tomorrow I’m going to find a Healer: _

Rolan thought she was overreacting, Dara could tell, but he left it alone.

_:Rolan: _she sent, rising to her feet. Her legs protested; she had done a lot of walking today, and even so explored no more than a tenth of the city. _:What can you actually do, in the spirit plane?: _

Another cagey pause. _:Talk to spirits, perhaps, and sometimes to the gods’ avatars. We know Vanyel claims to have spoken to the Star-Eyed Goddess herself, there: _

_:What sort of spirits?: _

_:Chosen, not now: _

Dara subsided with reluctance. _:All right: _She could ask Vanyel tomorrow, if Rolan still didn’t want to tell her anything.

_:Yfandes does confirm one thing: _Rolan added. _:The shaman took him there to ask a question – bringing it to his superiors is one way of looking at it, I suppose – and the answer was yes: _

Presumably the question Vanyel had gone there to ask. _:They’re going to let him see the memory tapestry: _

_:It seems so: _

That was a relief. _:Good!: _She hesitated. _:They aren’t going to let me look at it, though, are they?:_

_:I doubt it:_

That was a little disappointing – but it did mean she would go on having a lot of free time. Maybe even find a way to earn some coin, so they could stop worrying so much about the cost of the journey.

Rolan chuckled in her mind. _:Ever practical: _

_:I wish we’d thought to bring trade-goods: _Some Valdemaran perfumes or jewelry wouldn’t have taken up too much weight in her saddlebags, and the fee to rent a tiny stall in the main market wasn’t that high.

Maybe she could figure something out.

* * *

“Well, that’s it,” Savil said, sinking down into a chair. “Finally.” _Ooh. _She had been standing all afternoon in the hot, claustrophobic throne room, waiting for the delegation from the north to get all their questions out of the way and sign the damned treaty already; it was a huge relief to take the weight off her feet. She sighed. “Congratulations, Randi, I think you’ve set the record for Kingdom expansions in a single rein.”

Randi, sitting back in his padded chair with Shavri’s hand on his shoulder, raised an eyebrow and said nothing.

Tran closed the door behind them, and headed for the cabinet in the corner. “I think this calls for a drink.”

_It’s progress. _It felt like too little too late. Without the Council fully behind them, there were a lot of actions that Randi couldn’t take. The larger wartime Guard had never fully de-mobilized after the Karsite war, well, there had been Valdemaran troops in Karse until fairly recently. That was helpful, when it came to covering the north, but Keiran was right, it wasn’t an army that could hope to hold back Leareth. And armies took time to recruit, and train.

_Are we wasting our only chance? _

They were doing what they could. Lissa had been helping her think of creative pretexts to recruit volunteers for the Guard; they couldn’t institute a draft without the Council’s backing.

“Savil, wine?” Tran said.

She shook herself out of her thoughts. “Yes, please.”

“The Web,” Shavri said. “When do you think we’ll have coverage of the north?”

Savil closed her eyes, trying to remember how it had worked with Lineas-Baires. “I think Van said that once the treaty was signed, the Web expanded wherever a Herald rode out on circuit.” Which made sense; the Web couldn’t know about ink on a sheet of parchment. It was anchored on the Heralds. Heralds plus some sort of intent, she thought; it hadn’t expanded to cover Rethwellan when Vanyel traveled through. But if a Herald-Companion pair went in, knowing and expecting they were on Valdemaran soil… “I think that’s it. And we think the local _vrondi _don’t catch on right away.” She wondered how that worked. Vanyel had offered them a pact, similar to the sort of binding she had learned to banish elementals and Abyssal demons, but less formal and less coercive. Power from the Heartstone, in exchange for their vigilance. It was fairly open-ended, clearly, any _vrondi _could join it and access that energy, but maybe it took them a while to notice. Did they talk to each other, passing the message along?

She wondered if using a Truth Spell in the far north, calling the vrondi in to pay attention, would accelerate that process. It was worth testing.

“That’ll happen soon,” Randi said. “I’m sending the delegation back up the North Trade Road, with an envoy and all the Heralds we can spare for them. The mages we have on what used to be the Border will peel off and head north. Tran, that’s Elaina and…remind me who?”

“Vatri and Tamara,” Tran said. “They’re both from the last cohort we graduated, so they haven’t been in Whites long.”

And none of the three were especially powerful, low Master-level at best, though that went a lot further with the new Web. Vatri and Tamara in particular had been been Chosen after the Web was complete, and so had spent all of their training working with it. Drawing on the Web’s energy, they could Gate short distances, and there had been opportunities to train them in concert-work.

The other two Herald-Mages, Nani and Etran, were on the eastern and western borders respectively. The south had no Valdemaran mages at all. Karis trusted her priesthood now, and they couldn’t justify spending that defence on a friendly border.

Nine mages – no, she reminded herself, nine Herald-Mages. She had another eight foreign mages now, and maybe a ninth, if Arkady ever made any progress in his training. Still, Savil remembered when there had been five times that number. Dakar’s pointless, stupid, accidental death couldn’t have come at a worse time.

Leareth might have hundreds of mages. Who knew how many mage-gifted children he had snatched from border towns and smallholdings before anyone even noticed?

Again the flinch. _How can we even think about negotiating with him? _

Savil could hear the others speaking, Shavri asking something about Healers, but her mind was drifting.

_I want you to come to your own conclusions, _Vanyel had said. _Because the stakes are so high, and I can’t afford to make mistakes._

She wanted to be able to offer him that much.

It had gotten a little easier to think about, in the last six weeks. There was more distance, now; the part of her crying out that it was unthinkable was gradually calming.

Maybe it helped that Vanyel was many hundreds of miles away, and so it felt safer to poke at certain questions. _If it’s too late for us to reconcile, _he had said, _then that’s already true. Ignoring it won’t change it. _

He was right – in some nebulous way, she hadn’t felt safe speaking to him of it. Or thinking about it when he was nearby, and might walk in and…what? Talk her into a corner, until she had to either believe some monstrous conclusion or turn her back on him forever?

Put like that, it seemed overblown. They had been through so much. _I won’t give up on you that easily, ke’chara. _

She had reread Seldasen on ethics for the first time since she was seventeen, and somehow it had hit much harder. Maybe because things that had been entirely hypothetical at the time, that had drifted past as adult wisdom, were now all too real. _I’ve had to make those decisions. _Idealism had come a lot easier before the Karsite war, and Seldasen’s quiet, ruthless pragmatism made sense to her now.

Seldasen wasn’t Leareth. That came clearly through the pages – there were a few places where his personal opinion explicitly ignored the sort of multiplication-by-numbers reasoning that Leareth leaned on. But he was always very clear that it _was _his personal opinion, and he laid out the considerations that might point to the other side.

There was virtue in that kind of fair-mindedness, Savil had found herself thinking, and she knew it was a virtue she didn’t have. Yet.

Well, being a Herald had demanded that she grow in all sorts of ways. _If I can learn how to read faces well enough to manage Council politics, I can damned well learn this as well. _


	10. Chapter Ten

As Vanyel took a step into the broader stone room, Karna held out a hand, blocking him. “No.” She pointed at the floor.

Vanyel froze. “Sorry.” There was a rug, he saw, spread across the floor – no, a tapestry.

_Is this it? _He had expected a whole room full of tapestries, to fit the entire history of a people – and he should have expected it to look old, maybe, but not so faded that he could barely pick out the images it had once born. The dim lighting wasn’t helping, either.

“It is too old to hang,” Karna said. “Sit.” She gestured to another stone bench, pressed up against the wall – and then, to his surprise, blew out the candle she had carried in. The darkness that settled over them was almost complete. “We wait, now.”

“Wait for what?” He had already waited all day, and then waited another candlemark outside the core of the city for Karna to see him.

“For the moon.”

Vanyel glanced up. He hadn’t consciously noticed it until now, clearly he was very distracted, but the square, stone-walled room had a roof entirely of glass, small panes of it leaded together. _I’m glad we waited until nightfall, or it would be a hothouse in here. _He could see the stars above, only slightly distorted.

There must have been subtle magical shielding on the walls, because he couldn’t feel Yfandes anymore.

“This is only one of our memories,” Karna said, “but it is the one that is shown to all apprentices, and it would be well for you to see it first.” Her attitude toward him was different, today, Vanyel thought – she was quiet and subdued, as though she didn’t know what to say, and he kept catching her glances at him in the corner of his eye, some mixture of dubious and awed.

He wondered if she had gone back to the Moonpaths, after Dara dragged him barely-conscious out of the inner city, and gotten any more out of the _leshy’a Kal’enedral. _

Her eyes rested on him for a moment. “Take down your shields,” she said suddenly.

“What?”

“You must be open.” The slightest twitch of a smile. “I know that face you make. The walls are shielded, do not worry.”

“I know.” That wasn’t the part that worried him.

For better or worse, he reminded himself, he was putting himself in Karna’s hands. Either trust her, or walk out now. He took a deep breath, and lowered his shields.

“You know a trance-exercise, I hope?” Karna said. “Take a moment to clear your mind.”

Vanyel nodded and closed his eyes – it seemed liked whatever was about to happen, it didn’t involve actually _looking _at a tapestry too faded to decipher anyway. Focusing on his breath, he felt his heartbeat slow.

“I will begin the story,” Karna said, “so that your mind may be ready for this.” Her voice changed, falling into a rote, sing-song pattern. “In the long-ago time, we and what you now call Tayledras were one people, the Kaled’a’in, and our homeland was called Ka'venusho, in what was then the Kingdom of Tantara. We served and loved an overlord, one of the Great Mages of the time. Urtho, who was called the Mage of Silence.”

Urtho. Like a rock falling into a still pool, sending out ripples. _I know that name. _One Sovvan-night more than a decade ago, Leareth had burned a false mage-candle in memory, kneeling in a frozen wasteland.

_It is a very human error, _he had said, _to weight the deaths we witnessed, or caused, more than the others. Every life lost is a tragedy, every death a light torn out of the world – and yet some of them I hold closer than others._

Otherwise the story was familiar enough, though it was good to hear it confirmed. _The Mage of Silence. _ The title was familiar as well, though Vanyel couldn’t think where in particular he might have heard it before. It made him think of green and moist air – maybe he had overheard a snippet of some conversation in k’Treva Vale, and never thought to be curious about it.

“And so it was that when our lord Urtho was drawn into war, so, too, were we, and our people fought at his side. The end of that war brought great destruction, so great that it destroyed our homeland, yet the Mage of Silence had great care for us, his people, and when the situation was dire and he knew the war was to be lost, he gave us the means to escape.”

_No, _Vanyel thought, _stop, go back, I need to hear about the war. _But he didn’t want to interrupt, and apparently that wasn’t today’s story.

“It took us many years to find our way home,” Karna went on, “and when we came here, to this very spot–”

The moon had edged up in the sky, clearing the glass roof above their heads, and a single ray of silvery moonlight shone down onto the tapestry that lay spread on the flagstones.

“–This is what we saw.”

…Vanyel found himself no longer in the stone room. There had been no sensation of falling, none of the odd twisting motion when he had followed Karna onto the Moonpaths – he was simply somewhere else.

Someone else.

_Shaman Ravenwing shena Taylesederin, of the Hawk Clan, stood at the rim of the world, staring out onto what they had come so far to see. Which was…nothing. _

_The magic-twisted plants and animals had been bad enough, and in the preceding days, as they drew closer and closer, the flattened trees, debris, the complete absence of anything alive and moving as they approached the ridge of piled earth, should have been warning enough of what they would find. Yet she had never imagined this. _

_Only an empty crater, stretching on and on into the misty distance, so vast that she could see nothing of the other side. The force of the blast had carved deep into the earth, so that the glassy, fused sheet of rock at the bottom lay many, many man-heights below her. _

_Their homeland was gone. _

_Tears blurred her eyes, dissolving the awful sight into thousands of shards, and Ravenwing reached blindly for the Clanspeople on either side of her, clutching at them, the only living things left within fifty miles. _

_The war was won, or so she had thought – there had been no sign of Ma’ar’s activities, in the years it had taken them to find their way back on foot. _

_Won, but at what cost? _

_Ma’ar was dead, and so was Urtho, and everything that she had ever held dear. _

–Vanyel found himself bent over his knees, gasping. The image of the crater faded in and out, as though he were half-waking from a dream.

_What is this? _It was some kind of mage-craft, it had to be, but it didn’t feel like anything he had ever experienced.

“Do not fight it,” he heard Karna say. “Simply watch.”

_(A shift) _

_They had hastily pitched the Clan Council tent, to offer a little shade, here where no trees stood, and to block the sight of the desolation beyond. _

_Ravenwing sat, and with her were the other shamans, the Clan Elders, every leader of every surviving Kaled’a’in clan. There was a decision to be made – and a dispute. One that had been simmering quietly for years, but the destruction left by Urtho’s final counterattack had brought it to the surface. _

_"Our warsteeds are everything anyone could wish; there have been no changes made to them for generations. The bondbirds are not entirely all one could wish, but is it worth holding such a dangerous, double-edged power simply to improve them a little more?" _

_It was Silverhorse who spoke, her Clan Chief, and among them all, he was the most deep-set against magic in all forms. Ravenwing, doubtful at first, found herself more and more in agreement. It was magic that had done this to the world, after all. _

_Firemare Valavyska, Elder for the Owl Clan, surged forward. “What, you think that is all magic does? Precisely what do you intend to do about those who do not share your scruples, our enemies who would use any weapon they have against us? Who will protect you from the attacks of mages if you banish magic from our lives?”_

_Traditionally – once upon a time, before the war, when there had been anything like tradition – it had been the clans of Falcon, Owl, Raven, Eagle and Fox who worked most by means of magic. They had lost more in the war, Ravenwing knew, since they had fielded so many mages and Healers to Urtho’s armies. Her own Hawk Clan, and the Clans of Wolf, Grasscat, and Deer, had avoided magery even before the decimation of their land. _

_Given that, the split was perhaps not surprising. Falcon, Owl, and Raven Clans had no intent of giving up their powers. Eagle and Fox might go either way, Ravenwing thought – but even so, she saw no way their people could come through this intact. _

_“Who protected us this time?" Silverhorse shouted, rising to his feet and ripping up the tent-flap to reveal the ruined crater._

_Ravenwing winced and averted her eyes. Urtho had protected them; had died protecting them. Perhaps at a cost that she would rather not have paid, but they were alive. It felt like a desecration of Urtho’s memory to claim that he alone was responsible for this. True, he had made mistakes – but in the end, however wise and learned, he had been only a mortal man. _

_“Magic protected you this time by giving you the means to escape, little brother.” It was Suncat Trevavyska who spoke, of Falcon Clan. "Magic has saved you before, and it will again. Besides, how do you propose to repair this damaged land if not by magic?” _

_More voices, piling onto each other, a debate that she knew would rage late into the night. _

_Ravenwing closed her eyes. I’m tired. I want to go home. And I can’t. _

Caught up in the tide of someone else’s memories, Vanyel struggled to cling to himself. _I’m not her. This is the past. _Still, he could feel the keen edge of her grief as though it was his own. It was a strange sort of intimacy, and he wasn’t sure if it ought to make him uncomfortable, sharing the private thoughts and feelings of a dead woman – then again, they weren’t really private. Karna had said that every shaman-apprentice went through this experience. 

There was a dreaminess to the memory, and it made it hard to be curious. Vanyel struggled against it. Focus. _I have to pay attention, have to notice… _

There was a strange layered feeling to it – the images were there, if hazy around the edges, and the feelings of the moment, but there was a certain distance – the words spoken had a rehearsed quality, and the thoughts he was sensing seemed almost more like interpretation. However this had been done, Vanyel found himself thinking, this memory had been recorded after the fact, perhaps years later. As accurately as possibly, he was sure, but memory was never completely trustworthy.

…And how could he be sure it was accurate? Not knowing how the method worked, it might be just as easy to lay down false-constructed memories as true ones.

_(A shift)_

_Ravenwing stared at the horizon, even though the last member of the Five Clans had long slipped from sight, north and west. The argument had raged for days, and in the end there had been no way to resolve it. _

_Half of her people were gone, taking with them their bondbirds and everyone who had chosen to continue using mage-craft – they were calling themselves the Taylesederas, now, or “Brothers of the Hawk”. Left behind, were those who wished to banish magic from their lives forever, and they had no name for themselves, no home, no purpose. No plan. _

_Ravenwing swallowed, dried the last of her tears on her sleeve, and turned to face Silverhorse, still gazing onto the distance. She and her fellow shamans – from all the of the Nine Clans, not only the four who were to stay – had met separately, after the verdict was determined. _

_She was the one to present their beginnings of a plan to the Elder of Hawks. _

_“Well?" she said to him. “You have succeeded in this much; there is no longer magic among the People, other than that She and He give the shamans. Now what is your plan? Where do we go? what do we do? Will we find a homeland? Do we seek a new overlord?"_

_Silverhorse’s eyes were bleak, and she saw echoes of the same exhaustion that she felt deep inside. He held himself as though he carried a great weight – and she knew that he did. I’m sorry, she thought. _

_“I do not know. This land is torn and poisoned by magic turned awry; there is nowhere for us to go that we may claim without displacing someone else. Yet we cannot remain here.” _

_"We could.” _

_Silverhorse answered with a short bark of a laugh. “What? And eat rock? Drink our own tears? Watch our little ones warped and changed by the magic gone wild and twisted in this place?” Another laugh, devoid of humour; the pain concealed behind it tore at her. "Is that all you can offer me, shaman of the Hawk?” His laughter was wild now, half-hysterical. _

_Ravenwing silenced him with a single, open-handed slap. _

_“You told me when you urged that we forsake magic, that we must trust in the Powers for our protection. Are you telling me now that you no longer believe that? If that is true, then perhaps I should take my beasts and ride out after my Sundered brothers!” _

_Silverhorse stared at her. Shocked that she had struck him, maybe – it was not like her at all. Her whole life she had been soft and kind and gentle – but that was not what was needed now. Not in this new, barren world. Please, she thought, stay with me, focus. I need you to be strong now. _

_His mouth worked. “I – I believe that – but…” _

_“But what? You do not believe they would answer if we called on them?” She stared him down. “Or is it that you are not willing to pay the price they might put on our aiding?"_

_"Would they answer?" he asked, hope springing into his eyes. He licked his lips, hesitating. “…Have you done a Seeking, shaman of the Hawk?" _

_She nodded, slowly, and forced out the most difficult words. "I have done a Seeking and a Calling, and I have been answered. But the price of their aid will be in blood.”_

_His shoulders rose and fell in a shuddering breath. “Whose?”_

_“The Elders of each Clan that is left.” There, it was said, and she watched his face change as the words soaked in, his eyes turning inward. There was less shock there than she had expected, and less grief._

_Silverhorse was a relatively young man, for all that their years’ passage through the wasteland had etched new lines around his eyes. In another world, he might have had a whole life ahead of him – to partner, raise children, lead his people. And yet, this was the oath he had sworn as Elder. It felt deeply unfair, that the Powers would ask this of him. Of anyone. _

_But all things had a cost. Ravenwing understood that. _

_“It is not an easy question,” she said quietly. “Your three brother and sister Elders are being posed the same question even now. We do not expect you to answer at once, but it must be soon. The People, as you pointed out, cannot remain here long.”_

_And if I decline this…honor?" he asked, eyebrow raised. _

_Ravenwing ignored the bitter irony – it was just like Silverhorse, to lighten the pain with humour.“Then I spill my blood in place of yours. It must be one or the other of us.” Her voice was level. She had already stared down the possibility of it, preparing herself. _

_It would be a relief, in some ways. She was so tired. _

_“Leaving Hawk without a shaman.” _

_“It must be one or the other of us,” she said calmly. “That is the Price the Calling named. We four chief shamans have spoken, and agreed. All of the apprentices have promise, but none is fit or trained to function on his own. If any of the chiefs must go, that Clan must live without a shaman until an apprentice is ready.” She started to turn away. “I will leave you to think on this. Come to me by moonrise with your decision.” _

_His hand on her shoulder stopped him. _

_“I do not need until moonrise. It is not all that difficult a choice to make, after all.” _

_She turned back to him, wide-eyed, just in time to catch his smile, a smile sweet and without fear. “When will you require me?" _

Distantly, Vanyel was aware that he was weeping. It shouldn’t have cut so deeply, the pain of a stranger who had died nearly two millennia ago, but it did. He could sense the overlay of complex feelings – how Ravenwing must have replayed this moment in her head a thousand times, regret and sorrow and gratitude mingling.

_(A shift) _

_Ravenwing stood facing the wide-open horizon, arms spread to the sky. This was the final moment, that she had been anticipating every second of every day for the last moon-and-some. _

_The positioning had taken the longest, for each Clan to find a place at the rim of the glassed pit that had been their home, facing each cardinal direction – especially Cat Clan, who had made a full half-circle around to the west. _

_At sunset, each of the four Elders have given themselves for their people. Silverhorse had simply stepped off the top of the ridge, without a sound. Without hesitation. Falling into darkness, and then he was gone. _

_There would be time for tears later. _

_Ravenwing stood above the place he had fallen, calling on the Powers with every fibre of her being, and behind her all the rest of Hawk Clan, from the babes in arms to the oldest grandsires – though few of each of those, the journey had been hard on both the very young and the very old – behind her, they added their prayers. _

_And with the rising moon, She came._

_It was nothing that Ravenwing would ever be able to describe to anyone. The face of her Goddess shifted from moment the moment, Maid to Crone, Warrior to Mother, filling the sky – and yet She stood directly before Ravenwing, a woman in black, her features were those of the Kaled’a’in people but her eyes weren’t. _

_Eyes that held the whole night sky._

_She spoke, and Her voice filled Ravenwing. She was an overflowing vessel, scraped clean, no room left for thought or doubt or fear. _

Vanyel, drifting in the memory, could feel what Ravenwing did toward her Goddess – the awe, even love, though it wasn’t as simple as adoration. Ravenwing saw the Star-Eyed, certainly not as a person, but nothing as impersonal as a force of nature either. And not omnipotent. The Star-Eyed was a being, far greater than human power, but still limited.

Ravenwing believed, deeply, that the Goddess watched over her people, cared for them, that she was capable of something like love – and here was confirmation of that belief.

_Is that true? _Vanyel struggled against the odd lassitude of the memory, clinging to the thread of his thoughts. _Ask the right questions._ Ravenwing might have believed it, and she might have been wrong. He doubted the memory was entirely false, though he supposed he couldn’t rule it out – there was a certain feeling to it, a depth of sincerity, Ravenwing felt like _he _had when he came face-to-face with a goddess and he didn’t think that could be faked.

_“I have heard your prayers,” the Star-Eyed Goddess said, “as I have heard the prayers of your Sundered brothers. There was a price to be paid for what they asked, and there is a price to be paid for what you ask.” _

_“In blood?” The voice belonged to Azurestar, shaman of Cat Clan, yet as clear as though he stood next to her, and a tiny part of her was able to notice that, and wonder. _

_“Not in blood,” the Goddess said, “or none more than has been shed already. This price will be borne by the living, and not the dead. See this.” _

_She held out Her hand, and cupped within it was the crater. In the center, and scattered about it, beneath the slag and fused stone, were…things. Shapeless, glowing. Terrifying. _

_“Three things destroyed the homeland,” the Goddess said. “The self-destruction of the Gate that you fled through – the Final Strike of your master and overlord, and the firing of the safeguards on his Tower, intended to destroy his stronghold before it might fall into enemy hands – and a great weapon of your master’s design, one final effort to defeat your enemy. Yet despite all this, there are many weapons of Urtho's making that still remain and could be used, buried beneath the slag and rubble. There are weapons there that are too dangerous even for those with good intentions to hold. But you have forsworn magic for all time. They will be no temptation to you.” _

_Ravenwing could only nod, and try not to shudder. The Final Strike…a weapon… She had known Urtho must be dead, and grieved for him, but they hadn’t seen it happen – he had evacuated them through the Gate before the final confrontation. She had thought they would never know. _

_On reflection, maybe she would have preferred not to know, the pain of it was almost worse – but if there was danger still, lying sleeping beneath the land, they needed to prevent another Cataclysm at all cost. _

_The Goddess went on, before Ravenwing could find space to think. “Here, then, is the price. You must guard your new land, which is to be called Dhorisha Shin’a, the Plains of Sacrifice, and yourselves the Shin'a'in, the People of the Plains. You must keep strangers out at all cost, unless they pledge themselves into the Clans, or are allies that you, the shamans, must call on Me to judge. Those will be marked in ways that you will recognize. You will never swear to any overlord again, but will remain always sworn only to each other and to the Powers. You have forsworn magic, and you must keep that vow. Any of your children that are born with Mage-Gift, you must either send to your Sundered brothers, bring into the craft of the shaman, or permit the shaman to block the Gift. You, and your descendants to come, must do all of things things for all time. That is the pact I can offer you.”_

_It was, Ravenwing though, a much greater sacrifice than mere blood. The giving up of freedom, and not just for herself, nor even for those who stood with her – but for all generations, their children and their children’s children, forever. _

_And yet, the gain…_

_I can go home, she thought. Not to rest, never to rest…but home. _

_In the end, it wasn’t her choice, or not hers alone – she felt the assent of her people, somehow sensing it like a breeze on her face, and after a moment’s thought, she added her own wordless Yes._

_The Goddess smiled, and it was like the whole world fell into alignment with the light of the moon. “It is well,” she said. _

_And the Goddess stepped down from the sky, stepped down from the ridge into the crater, and began to walk. She spread her hands, and wherever her feet touched, a carpet of flowers grew. Grass, trees, springing up to hide the ruined scars. _

_She walked west, into the horizon. _

…Vanyel floated up from the memory, a bit of flotsam tossed against a stony shore. His face ached and it was hard to breathe; he realized he was still crying, curled into himself on the bench.

“Vanyel?” he heard a quiet voice say. Candlelight flared on his eyelids.

He held up a hand, without lifting his head. “Need a minute. Can you, just…” Remember to breathe. He forced the air in and out through gritted teeth. _Pull yourself together, Herald. _The last thing he wanted to be doing was completely losing his composure in front of a Shin’a’in Swordsworn. Scrollsworn.

_– a smile sweet and without fear – it would be a relief, she was so tired – falling into darkness, and then he was gone – time for tears later – _

Slowly, painfully, Vanyel fought to disentangle the reverberations of his own grief from the memories of a long-dead shaman. An echo of a whisper that sounded like Melody: _try not to fight it or shut it out, but you don’t have to address it yet either. _

He raised his head, wiping his face on his sleeve. “I’m sorry,” he said thickly.

“You need not be sorry.” Karna’s eyes were sympathetic. “It is a difficult thing to witness, for all of us, and you less prepared than most.” She reached out to touch his shoulder. “You are kind of heart, and so it hurts, to see the suffering of others.”

Glass ceiling or not, the room felt suddenly claustrophobic. “Need to be outside,” he mumbled.

“Of course.” Karna stood, and offered her arm. To his surprise, Vanyel needed her help to drag himself to his feet. His limbs felt very heavy.

As soon as they crossed the threshold to the outdoors, Yfandes’ mindvoice battered at him. _:Chosen! Are you all right?:_

He winced; her light seemed to sting the raw insides of his mind. _:I’m fine. I think: _He found that he was shivering; the air had become quite cold, and he hadn’t thought to bring a cloak, it had still been oppressively hot when he walked over.

_:You were in there for four candlemarks: _Yfandes sent tartly.

_:…Was it that long?: _It hadn’t felt like it, in the memory. _:It was worth it: _He ought to write all of it down as soon as possible, make sure he didn’t forget it.

“Vanyel?” Karna said.

He turned to face her. “Thank you.” It was still hard to speak. “Um, is there more?”

A smile. “Not for tonight, I do not think. Go, rest. Come back tomorrow at sunset.”

_:’Fandes, meet me at the direction-post?: _He flashed an image of it to her, and started walking.

Ma’ar. He must have been the enemy that Urtho had fought, who had killed him – though not directly in combat, if Urtho had called Final Strike to destroy his own home before it could be taken. Ravenwing had thought Ma’ar dead – but maybe he hadn’t really died, not permanently.

Leareth had burned a candle for Urtho on Sovvan. _He knew him. _

Ma’ar.

Leareth?

* * *

Dara was sitting cross-legged in the tent, needle and thread in her hands, irritably stitching up a rip in one of her tunics. She hated sewing, but she wasn’t about to pay for someone else to do it – or, Havens forbid, ask Vanyel.

_:He would probably mind it less than you: _Rolan sent, amusement rumbling in his mindvoice.

_:Still!: _Asking the most powerful Herald-Mage in the Kingdom to fix her Whites for her was ridiculous. _:Rolan, anything from Yfandes?:_

_:No. It is rather late. Goodnight, Chosen: _

_:Goodnight, Rolan. I love you: _

Her Companion withdrew from her mind, and Dara sighed and rubbed her eyes. It was probably time for her to sleep, as well, but she had wanted to wait up until Vanyel was done with whatever he was doing, just in case he needed rescuing again.

Well, she had plenty of mending to keep her hands busy. Traveling was very hard on clothing, it turned out, and so was climbing around on giant tent-sculptures. A young Shin’a’in man she had befriended had dared her to climb up the inside of the struts that supported the Clan Jor'ethan bear-tent, and hang from the bear’s teeth. Dara had done it, of course, to raucous shouts and applause – it had been entirely worth it.

She tied a knot, bit off the trailing thread, turned to find the spool in her sewing kit – and froze.

A woman stood in front of her, clad in black from head to toe. The lower half of her face was veiled, and her blue eyes were piercing. Two swords hung at her hips.

_:Rolan, help!: _“What are you doing in my tent?” Dara yelped, scrabbling for Need – realizing, a moment later, that maybe drawing a weapon was just going to make the intruder _more _angry.

Too late; she was already up in a crouch, the blade held in front of her, it had all happened on instinct and Need was sensing her alarm, rousing.

Rolan surged into her mind, annoyance at being woken, a moment of alarm – and then he calmed. _:No need to panic, Chosen: _

The woman laughed, a dusty sound. “You are quick, girl. Come outside.” Her voice was strange – it sounded like someone might if they were talking up at her from a deep pit.

“Who _are _you?” Dara demanded.

“That is not important. Come outside.”

_:She is a leshy’a Kal’enedral: _Rolan sent.

_:A leshy’a – wait! But they’re spirits! How?: _Vanyel had told her, in the morning, about having met one the night before. In the spirit world. Not walking into their damned tent! Even he hadn’t really known any more about what they _were_. He had said the one he had met seemed more human than the Star-Eyed, but not entirely. What was that supposed to mean?

Rolan chuckled in her mind, and didn’t answer her question.

Dara took a deep breath, and warily followed the woman out of the tent. “Why are you here?” she said, standing to her full height and squaring her shoulders.

“You are _Verkal'enedral_,” the woman said.

“I don’t know what that means.” It had the word ‘kal’enedral’ in it, obviously, but Dara didn’t recognize the syllable at the beginning, and it didn’t make sense anyway. She wasn’t Swordsworn; she wasn’t even Shin’a’in.

“Herald of Valdemar.” The woman drew the sword at her left hip, in one smooth motion. “Guardian. Protector. Would you dance with me?” Dara couldn’t see her mouth, but there was a smile in her voice.

“Um, you mean sparring, right?” _:Rolan, should I?: _There was enough light for it to be safe enough – the moon was almost full, blazing down on them.

_:I do not see why not: _

She had Need at her side, which _should _have helped, except that Need was behaving oddly right now; she was awfully quiet, but there was a humming tension on the edge of Dara’s awareness.

Dara raised the sword, and the woman blurred into motion.

–Maybe thirty seconds later, but thirty _very long _seconds, Dara was on her bottom on the dirt, the sword knocked three yards away.

“I yield!” she yelped, flinging up her hands over her face.

The woman laughed. “Very good, for a first try. Your teacher trained you well.” She held out a hand. “Up, girl.”

Dara hesitated before taking the woman’s black-gloved hand. It felt solid. Real. Not spirit-like at all.

On the second bout, the woman, having gauged her skill, went easier on her. Still, after parrying back and forth for maybe two minutes, Dara was tiring, and she misjudged a strike, and found herself on her behind again.

“You are out of practice,” the woman said, a hint of disapproval in her strange, distant-echoey voice.

“Hey, well, I’ve been traveling.” Dara retrieved the sword and scrambled to her feet, bending over her knees and trying to catch her breath. “Haven’t had time to spar.” She wiped sweat out of her eyes with her sleeve. “Why are you here?”

“Is it not obvious?” One blue eye winked, and then the woman’s sword flashed out again.

“You want to – teach me – to fight better?” Dara gasped out, dodging.

No answer except for a strike aimed at her head. Dara ducked.

Oddly enough, she realized a moment later that she was having fun. She had always enjoyed sparring, even back when she barely knew which end of her wooden practice-blade to hold. And Need might not be actively helping, but she was still a very fine, well-balanced sword, much better than any of the pot-metal practice blades Dara had trained with.

She wasn’t sure how long they fought, or how many times the woman who might or might not be a spirit disarmed her. Once, and just once, she managed to disarm her in return. _Probably only because she let me – _but it still felt good, and a fierce grin pulled her lips back from her teeth.

Finally, the black-clad woman stepped back. “Enough. Tomorrow night, same time.”

“What?” Dara sagged to the ground, eager for the reprieve. “Can’t you at least tell me your name?”

Silence.

Dara’s eyes were burning from the sweat that had dripped into them, and her hair, which was really overdue to be trimmed, was plastered down her forehead and half in her eyes. She blinked.

The mysterious woman was gone.

Dara flopped down on her back and spread her limbs, not even caring that she would get dust all over. _:Rolan, that was weird. That’s the weirdest thing that ever happened to me: _

_:You did well: _Rolan sent, approval in his mindvoice.

_:I need to go wash up: _She wasn’t going to sleep covered in sweat and dirt. There was a public wash-trough nearby, and no one in Kata’shin’a’in seemed to care if you walked about naked – Vanyel had commented that it was just like a Tayledras Vale. Not that anyone with sense would go naked in the daytime, you would end up red as a tomato and peeling all over.

_:Do that: _A pause. _:Yfandes says that Vanyel is on his way back:_

* * *

_– An endless crater, slagged rock stretching to the horizon – a man, smiling, turning away and stepping off a cliff, falling into darkness – moonlight – a Gate – a boy with dark-golden curls, blood on his cheek, turning away – sky turned to blue-white fire – the whole world in flames, pain and despair – _

Dara woke to Vanyel’s screams. The inside of the tent was pitchy-dark; she scrabbled to free herself from her blankets, rolling over and sitting up. _Ow. _She was very sore, after all that surprise sparring. “Vanyel, hey, wake up–” _:Vanyel, wake up, it’s just a nightmare: _

Her Mindtouch skidded against his shields, he wasn’t picking up his end of the link, but the cry cut off. She heard only his ragged breathing.

“Vanyel?” she said, tentatively. “Are you all right?” She would have sworn that she had been dreaming, just before – oh. Not _her _dream. He must have been projecting.

Vanyel had warned her at the beginning of the journey that he often had nightmares, and it was true that sometimes he thrashed and whimpered in his sleep, but it rarely woke her. Nothing like this had ever happened before.

Dara blinked hard, lifting a hand to her eyes, as light flared. “Sorry,” Vanyel said, his voice hoarse and unsteady, the mage-light in his palm illuminating his face from below and making him look frighteningly corpse-like. He was still breathing hard. “I didn’t mean – I’m sorry.”

“It’s fine.” Dara tried to smile.

“You can go back to sleep,” Vanyel said. He raised a hand to scrub at his eyes, and then returned the smile, very unconvincingly. “I, just – need to take a walk.”

“I’ll come with you.” She started to reach for her tunic.

“You don’t have to–”

“I don’t mind. Really. I’m awake now.” She wondered if his Yfandes was awake. Rolan wasn’t, and Dara decided against disturbing him for a second time. “Were you dreaming about what you saw today?”

“Mmm.” Vanyel sent the mage-light over his head and reached for the pile of his clothes, puddled at the foot of the tent. Dara, as usual, tried not to stare at his scars. She hadn’t dared ask about the stories behind any of them, which meant her imagination always tried to run wild.

He looked thin – she could count the knobs of his spine. Dara had thought ahead, and during the day she had scouted for some foodstuffs that were easier to eat than travel-jerky and would keep in the tent without spoiling. Vanyel had forced down half a bread-roll just to make her happy before collapsing into his bed.

She couldn’t understand it. _I’m worried about putting on weight here. _People at the big clan tents kept offering her food, and usually it was exotic and delicious.

“Sorry, I’m going to be a mother-hen,” she said. “Eat the other half of your bread. Or else we could go to Clan For'a'hier camp, they usually have food all night.” And ale, and fire-dancers. She had stayed up _far _too late the first night because she hadn’t wanted to stop watching them.

“I’ll take the bread,” Vanyel said tonelessly, pulling his shirt over his head.

“And some cheese.”

“Fine.”

After a moment’s thought, Dara reached into her saddlebags to dig for her cloak, wincing at the pull of abused muscles in her shoulders. She still didn’t understand how anywhere could be so hot in the daytime and so cold at night.

A couple of minutes later, they were out under the stars. The moon was setting, and the eastern horizon was just starting to lighten to midnight-blue. Vanyel stood for a moment, head flung back, taking deep breaths.

“Better?” Dara said.

“Yes.” He glanced over at her, and then started walking, fast.

Dara jogged to catch up, stiff-legged. _I think I might have pulled something._ “Vanyel, hey, do you want to talk about what they showed you? You don’t have to, but if you can’t sleep anyway, I thought maybe…” She was very, very curious.

“Might as well.” He didn’t look at her. “Gah. I meant to take notes, so I’d remember it, I forgot. Guess I should tell you what I remember now, and write it down when we get back.” He took a breath. “First of all, it’s magic. The tapestry, I mean. It’s a record of a person’s memories. The one they showed me was from a shaman who was called Ravenwing…”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For reference, the epic Ravenwing memories are *literally canon* (from a different trilogy), and also might as well be custom-written to be upsetting for Vanyel. Good job, Mercedes Lackey! That is why I write in this setting.


	11. Chapter Eleven

“Come on!” Jisa said. “There’s something I want to show you!”

Stef trailed after her. “I thought we were having supper with your mother.”

Jisa didn’t even look back. “She’s busy tonight. They were signing a treaty or something. Come _on_.”

Stef was never going to get used to the casual way she talked about it. “Is that for the alliance with the north?”

“Yes, that. I helped my papa with ideas for it!”

“You did?” Stef managed to catch up, matching his stride to hers.

“Well, maybe not for the treaty. I talked to him about building schools there.” Jisa smiled brightly. “I told him we should build schools that have rooms where orphans can live, so they don’t have to live on the street like you did.”

Stef wasn’t sure how he felt about that. With anyone else, he would probably have been offended, but it was very hard to take offence at anything from Jisa.

“This way!” She grabbed his arm and tugged him down a corridor.

“Where are we going?” Stef wasn’t sure he had ever been in this part of the Palace.

“It’s a surprise!”

Around another corner. Down some stairs. Stef kept quiet and followed.

“Here we are!”

A stone wall, and a heavy door. Jisa stopped, and delicately fished a ring of keys from her pocket.

“Jisa, are you supposed to have those?” Stef said carefully. She would probably be hurt if he straight-up asked whether she had stolen them.

“Yes! It’s fine, I asked Herald Tantras if I could borrow them.”

_Of course you did. _He watched Jisa fiddle around, selecting one of the larger keys and inserting it into the lock with exaggerated care.

“Look!” she said, with triumphant pride.

It was a small stone room. There was a stone bench that wrapped all the way around, and a stone table in the middle, and on it was the largest crystal Stef had ever seen, a smooth-polished hemisphere of quartz the size of his head. It seemed almost fused to the surface of the table.

“Go on,” Jisa encouraged. “Go in and look at it!”

Stef crossed into the room – and he felt the change. The sounds of the Palace around him, the sigh and creak of wood and stone and the distant footfalls of people in other hallways, were gone – there was only silence, and the rush of his own pulse in his ears. Even his own footsteps were muted.

Interesting. Stef closed his eyes, hummed a note – and felt his Gift stop dead, reflected back at him. That confirmed it; there was shielding on the walls, and apparently it was _complete _shielding, proof against Bardic as well.

Jisa must have guessed the test he was running. “Uncle Van said he thinks King Valdemar made these shields,” she said.

Stef knew a little more now about Kingdom-security than he had before, and about mage-craft, it had been part of his homework with Katha because she said it was relevant. To his surprise, he found it easy to learn and remember, even though he couldn’t use magic. Stef was pleased. It seemed useful to know, and maybe someday he could impress Herald Vanyel by being able to hold a sensible conversation about magery.

“This is the Web-focus room,” he guessed. “Jisa, are we really supposed to be in here?”

“It’s fine.” But Jisa glanced out into the hallway and then closed the door behind them. “Mama took me here once,” she said. “Mama can’t properly use it because she isn’t a Herald, but the Web lets her talk to it, because she helped make it.”

“What, really?” Stef paced once around the table, and then sat down on the bench. “I thought Herald Vanyel made the new Web.”

“Not all by himself, silly! That would be too hard.”

It was hard to imagine _any _work of magic being too hard for Vanyel – although, if anything was, the warning-system that watched over all of Valdemar would probably qualify.

“Uncle Van did it with my Aunt Savil and Herald Jaysen before he died.” Jisa’s face fell for a moment, then brightened. “Stef, see if you can talk to it.” 

“What?” He stared at her.

“It’s a Heartstone,” Jisa said, very patiently. “So it’s sort of a bit alive. I don’t know if you can because you don’t have Mindspeech, but you do have Bardic Gift and that’s sort of like Empathy and – just try it?”

“I don’t know how!”

“Like this.” Jisa put her hands on the half-sphere, and closed her eyes. A moment later, she opened them. “It says hello.”

“It does?” Just when Stef thought Jisa couldn’t possibly surprise him any more, she did it again.

Jisa shrugged. “Sort of. It’s not a person and it’s not _really _alive. It remembers me from when I came with Mama, though, she introduced me to it. Mama thinks you don’t have to be a Herald to talk to it, you just have to be Gifted.” She held out a hand. “Come over here, I’ll introduce you.”

When Jisa got that bossy tone in her voice, it was easiest just to go along with it. Stef stood, reluctantly – he had been on his feet half the afternoon for a recital – and let Jisa guide his hand to touch the quartz.

It felt warm, and seemed to hum, almost pulsing; it was disconcerting. Other than that, he didn’t feel anything.

Jisa frowned. “Maybe sing to it?”

“_Sing _to it?”

“That is how you use your Gift.”

It seemed worth a try, and Jisa wasn’t going to leave him alone until he did. Stef closed his eyes again, and took a deep breath.

_It was just a week till Sovvan / and the nights were growing chill…_

He wasn’t sure why he had chosen that song. Maybe just because he had played it at the recital, he tried to play one Vanyel song at every performance even if Medren teased him about it, and it was still running through his head. Stef pushed with his Gift, gently at first, feeling for echoes…

There was something there. Not a person, but some other kind of presence, bizarre and alien.

_:?:_

A wordless question, and Stef had no idea how to answer it, since he didn’t know what the question was – so he only pushed harder, and tried to imagine the song as a sort of greeting, or maybe an offering, like holding up the music between cupped hands. _I’m Stef and this is what I can show you. _

_:Stef?:_

Except it wasn’t his name, not really – it was everything he was that fell into the cracks between words, the Web recognized him, it _remembered _him and that didn’t make any sense, and it was still asking him a question but he didn’t understand what the question meant. Something was touching his mind, he could feel it, but it wasn’t at all like when Jisa had used Mindspeech to talk to him.

_– the brush of a starry void – _

A dozen images flashed by, too rapidly to count or absorb. A Companion, picking her way through a garden; Herald-Mage Savil, laughing; a grove of trees; a room with a high window and a door made of glass, sunlight slanting through–

Stef yelped and yanked back his hand as though the crystal had burned him.

“Stef?” Jisa said. Her hands were on his shoulders. “Stef, what happened?”

“I don’t know!” Stef’s heart was racing. He took a deep breath, backing even further away from the quartz globe, and half-fell onto the bench. “It, I don’t – it did something weird. I don’t like it.”

“I’m sorry!” Jisa’s voice rose to almost a whine. “Did it hurt you?”

“I don’t know.” Stef felt very shaky, but it didn’t _hurt, _exactly. “I…saw things.” He rubbed his eyes. “There was a Companion, I think. And your Aunt Savil.” The fragments were already fading.

“That’s strange.” Jisa’s voice was thoughtful. She sat down next to him. “Stef, can I Look at your mind? To see if it did something to you?” She took his hand. “I won’t read you with Thoughtsensing, I promise, I’ll just look at the shape of it.”

“…All right.” It wouldn’t do any harm, and maybe the Web had done something to him – he felt very odd. There was the sense of having _forgotten _something, something important, and the room around him felt half-unreal.

He was supposed to have been somewhere, supposed to have done something – he was _late, _there was a tugging franticness to the feeling…

He felt the touch of Jisa’s Sight, like sunlight only inside him.

“That’s funny,” Jisa said under her breath.

“…What’s funny?”

“I don’t know. Your mind looked different for a moment, is all. Like something _stretched _it.” She squeezed his hand. “It’s going away now. Are you feeling all right?”

“I think so.” The strangeness was fading – and he had the feeling of forgetting again, he could feel something slipping away, it had been important but in a moment he was going to forget having forgotten it. Stef made a half-hearted attempt to hold onto that slippery thought, and then gave in.

“I can ask Melody to look as well?” Jisa offered. “Her Sight is better than mine.”

“No, it’s fine.” Stef disentangled his hand from hers, and stood. “Can we go?”

“All right. I’m sorry.”

Jisa was very quiet and subdued as they walked down the hallway – this wasn’t how she had hoped it would go, Stef thought.

By the time they reached the door to outside, stepping out into the early-summer dusk, he couldn’t remember why he had been so uncomfortable.

* * *

“Welcome,” Karna said, gesturing to the cushion on the floor. “Sit.”

They weren’t in the tapestry-room, this time – they were in a different room nearby, with a fire burning and a kettle above it. Vanyel settled himself onto the offered seat, and Karna filled two cups from a pot.

“At moonrise we will go back,” Karna said. “First. You have questions?”

She seemed considerably warmer towards him today, Vanyel thought. He wasn’t sure why, exactly – was it because he had seemed so touched by their clan history? She had said he was compassionate, but that wasn’t why. _It just reminded me of my own ghosts. _

Whatever the reason, it was a relief, because he didn’t have the energy to wrangle cryptic statements, let alone hostility.

He had talked through last night’s experience in detail with Dara, walking until the sun rose, and then of course he hadn’t been able to go back to sleep. Two cups of chava had revived him enough to sit down and write out notes, and he had spent the late afternoon trying without too much success to nap.

“Yes,” he said. “I’m…not sure where to start.” He sipped the tea – it was herb-tea, and tasted odd and astringent. “I’m very curious about how it works,” he said finally. “I wouldn’t have imagined it was possible, to record memories in this way.”

The day before he had been too caught up in it, and then too distracted by his emotions, to be properly curious. He should have been more surprised. Confused. The tapestry hadn’t just contained images and sounds, which was impressive enough – it had held onto someone else’s _thoughts_. For nearly two thousand years. It seemed like something that should have been impossible. _I think it’s fair to say I know a lot about mage-craft, and I can’t think how I would even start. _

He wondered if Leareth would have a theory.

Did Leareth know about these records? Maybe not. It seemed like their true nature might not be known at all outside the Shin’a’in people, and that Vanyel’s permission to view them had required an escalation, if not to the Star-Eyed herself, at least to someone who represented Her.

Thought Kata’shin’a’in itself was easy enough to walk into, and he hadn’t seen _that _many guards on the buildings… _Leareth isn’t stupid. _A shred of rumour, and he would have tracked it down.

“It is a secret taught only to Shin’a’in shamans,” Karna said, her eyes narrowing and her voice clipped. 

“I understand, you can’t actually teach me how to do it. I’m not asking you to.” He took another sip of tea, searching for the right words – he didn’t want to offend her, but it would be foolish not to ask at all just for fear of that. “It would be useful to know some generalities. The limitations of it. Could anyone record a memory in this way, if they knew the spell?”

Karna shook her head. “It is more than simply a spell. One must invoke the Goddess – not a full manifestation, of course, but a trickle of Her power.”

“Oh. Like Heartstones.” That made sense. Something that was impossible with magic alone, might be possible with a fragment of a god cooperating.

…Did that mean the Star-Eyed could interfere directly in the contents of the records? Vanyel couldn’t think of a tactful enough way to ask. Maybe, and maybe not. He needed to think about it more.

Karna was watching him with a speculative look in her eyes. Surprised that he knew about Heartstones maybe, or that he had brought up the comparison. Come to think of it, had Starwind or Moondance ever explicitly told him that Heartstones worked that way? He didn’t think so. It had been Leareth’s guess.

“Ravenwing,” he said finally. “The person’s memories I saw. Who was she? I mean, I gathered she was the shaman to, what, the Hawk Tribe, but…” He wasn’t quite sure what he was asking.

“That which was to become Clan Tale'sedrin, yes,” Karna said. “Ravenwing is one of our earliest heroes. A brave woman, and wise. She lived for many years after our people’s return to our homeland, and she left her mark on many of our traditions. She was the first to say that all Shin’a’in would learn those first lessons, once taught only to shaman apprentices, that they might call on our Goddess in times of need. It was her insistence that we must always have more than one shaman and apprentice in each clan, in case of disaster or accident. And she was the one to build the tradition of the Kal’enedral.” Karna plucked at the hem of her midnight-blue robe. “Including those such as myself.”

“She made the tapestry?” Vanyel guessed. “Was she a mage, then? She seemed very against magic.”

“Yes,” Karna said, tilting her head in acknowledgement. “She did not do it alone, and the technique is still known – we have more recent histories as well.” A pause. “You must understand why she gave up magery.”

Vanyel could only nod. “From her perspective, it was magic that had destroyed her home. That makes sense. Not just Ma’ar, the enemy – it sounds like it was Urtho’s counterattack that actually did the most damage.”

“Yes,” Karna allowed. “We think perhaps it was not intended, though of course we do not know exactly what happened in those final days. No one who was there survived to tell of it – only those who had already evacuated through Urtho’s Gates, and were far away.”

Except Leareth. Who didn’t retain all of the memories of his past lives. Did he remember? Could his answers be trusted?

It was moot for now; he had no way of removing the block on his Foresight until he returned to Haven.

“Urtho was a great and wise man,” Karna went on. “He did much good, and yet he did harm as well, meddling with forces that should never have been harnessed by humankind. Ravenwing knew him as a scholar and a tinkerer. He took such joy in his discoveries and his creations, and…perhaps he did not always stop to think. In his innocent curiosity, he created terrible danger – and so we are bound here, to this day, guarding those relics that he left behind.”

Vanyel frowned. “The weapon that he used, that the Goddess mentioned – he must have thought it was worth it to stop Ma’ar.”

Karna’s gaze hardened. “Yes. It was. Ma’ar was a scourge on the world, and Urtho knew this, and knew the need to stop him from gaining the Tower, and all of the knowledge and artifacts that lay within. If such had fallen into his hands, there would have been no stopping him.” 

A scourge on the world… “Had Ravenwing met Ma’ar?” Vanyel said hopefully. “Is there any chance she recorded that memory as well?”

Karna shook her head. “Not face to face. We believe him to have been a student of Urtho’s, but that was many years before. She had met Urtho, however, and some of those memories are in the tapestry – and Urtho speaks of his enemy.”

“Then I want to see that,” Vanyel said. “Karna, I think this is the most important part. I need to know what sort of person Ma’ar was.” And what sort of person Urtho had been, the mage who had opposed him so vehemently that he was willing to blow up half the world just to ‘win’ a war.

Karna frowned, started to open her mouth, and then froze, the blood draining from her face.

_You just realized it, didn’t you? _Vanyel had been trying to think of a way to bring up his guess, but now it was moot.

Karna took a shaky breath, and moistened her lips. “You, you think – what – you think that _Ma’ar_ is the foe that you now face?”

Vanyel ducked his head. “Maybe. I can’t know for sure, yet, but Leareth knew Urtho’s name. And…implied, at least, that he killed him.”

Karna closed her eyes. “If it is true, then…he never truly died, for all Urtho’s efforts. By the highest gods…” She was trembling, hugging her knees to her chest. “It cannot be. The world would have been doomed long ago, had he lived.”

Vanyel felt his hands twisting together. “Maybe he didn’t actually want to destroy the world. Or, I don’t know, maybe it isn’t the same person at all. I could be wrong.”

Karna turned stony eyes on him. “If there had been anyone alive then to do this thing, it would be Ma’ar. It must have taken the darkest of magics, to hold one’s spirit back from its natural return to the gods.”

Vanyel started to answer, then cut himself off. Was there any reason to think that immortality could only be done with dark magic? Leareth’s current method could likely be described as ‘dark’, given that its cost came in the lives of others, but Need had a kind of immortality, and that didn’t seem to carry the same price. Not that she seemed quite like a person, either.

In any case, he didn’t think this was a conversation to have with Karna now. “I need to know more,” he said instead. “If you don’t have the memories of anyone who met this Ma’ar directly, I need to see as many memories I can of people who heard of his actions.”

Karna nodded slowly. “Most of our history as told here is after the events that you saw. Some is earlier. It will take some time, to see all of it, but we may begin tonight.”

Vanyel hesitated, chewing his lip. “Would I be able to see the first one again?” he said.

Karna twisted to look at him, startled. “You are the first I have ever heard ask that.” Her eyes creased. “It was hard to watch. You wish to do so a second time?”

No, but he ought to – by the time he had finally sat down to take notes, he had forgotten many of the details. Those details might _matter_, and this was his only chance. “If it’s possible.”

“Perhaps.” Her eyelids flickered. “If you wish, I might help you to prepare your mind, as we prepare our apprentices. It will be easier, then.”

“I would appreciate that.” He rubbed the side of his face; his sinuses had started to ache here, in the dry air. “I did have one more question. Karna, what are _leshy’a Kal’enedral, _really?”

Dara had told him about her adventure, or misadventure, the night before. Vanyel was more baffled than ever. Rolan seemed unperturbed.

A brief silence.

“Simply the spirits of those Kal’enedral who have chosen to serve the Goddess after the end of their mortal lives,” Karna said. “They serve as guardians and teachers to us.”

_Simply the spirits… _Vanyel’s mind skidded against it. Not simple at all.

_You are sworn to a sacred duty_, the spirit Kal’enedral had said, on the Moonpaths, _and a Guardian Spirit guides your way. You and the Kal’enedral have that much in common._

“Are they like Companions?” he said.

Karna’s face was very still for a moment.

“Perhaps in some ways,” she said. “They do not bond to us as your Companions do, and they come to us only sometimes.”

There was something she wasn’t saying, but Vanyel was too tired to chase that thread. “Thank you, Karna. That’s all of my questions for now.”

* * *

“Relax,” Karna said. “Let your mind be empty, and listen only to the words I say.” She glanced sideways at the window. “Are you ready?”

“I’m ready.”

They were in the glass-roofed room once again – or, no, not the same one, but another identical building. _I wonder how many there are. _The stars shone down on them, and the moon must have been nearly high enough by now.

Vanyel closed his eyes, counting his breaths, letting himself slip into a light trance.

“Our ancestor Ravenwing met Urtho, the Mage of Silence, for the first time when she was thirteen years old…”

This time, the memory took him almost immediately, as the moon cleared the tip of the stone wall.

_Ravenwing stood in the small classroom, hands clasped behind her back. It felt very odd to be between walls, deep in the stone of a tower. _

_Footsteps. “Hello. What is your name, child?” The words were in fluent Kaled’a’in, though with a faint accent. _

It was interesting, Vanyel noted distantly, that he seemed to have no difficulty understanding the language. The words were strange, but it was as though Ravenwing’s understanding was directly conveyed.

_She turned, lifting her chin. The man before her was exactly what she might have pictured, if someone had asked to imagine a wise old mage. Urtho, the Mage of Silence. Tall, thin, curly silver hair falling to his waist, with a prominent beak-like nose. His voice was deep, gentle, and his blue eyes were kind. _

_“I am Ravenwing shena Taylesederin,” she heard herself say. _

This memory was different. Hazier, the colours somehow faded, and not nearly as immersive. Like an artist’s unfinished sketch. There was barely any detail to the room they were in; Vanyel could almost feel his mind trying to fill in the gaps.

Urtho’s face, though, was crystal clear.

_“Come here,” Urtho said. “It will not hurt, I promise. I am merely going to assess your Gift.” _

_Trembling, Ravenwing took a step, then another. _

_She knew that the Mage of Silence personally saw to every mage-gifted child among her people, even if they did not wish to train with him. His school would be open to her, but she had been apprenticed to the shaman of Taylesederin for two years, and she did not wish to leave. _

_His hands came to rest on her head, and she closed her eyes, waiting. _

_She felt it then, an odd tickling inside her head, but it was over soon. “Very good,” Urtho said. “Your Gift is developing as it should, and someday you will be quite strong. It would be my pleasure to train you here.” _

_Ravenwing knew that if she accepted, Urtho would not be the one to teach her – he was the Archmage of Tantara, after all, and far too busy. She might see him only once for her final examinations. Still, the way he looked at her, with pride and warmth in his face, made her feel deeply cared for. It was almost painful to disappoint that smiling face. _

_“No,” she said. “I have a place and it is with Taylesederin.” _

The words felt different this time. Vanyel had the sense that this memory, dredged up from childhood decades later, was mostly interpretation – that maybe Ravenwing had only remembered vaguely what she had said to Urtho, and given it her best guess.

_Urtho did not seem disappointed at all. His smile only broadened. “You are to be a shaman, I hear. Good! I am sure you will do great things, child. And of course you are welcome to join us at our salons. They are open to all.” He touched her head again, ruffling her hair. “Do right by your people, Ravenwing shena Taylesederin. Make us proud.” _

_Ravenwing blinked, trying not to sniffle. She had heard it said by so many people that their overlord Urtho was wise and good, that as long as he and his Tower stood in Ka'venusho, all would be well in Tantara – and now she understood why. _

Vanyel drifted in the memory, a child’s bright awe and simple pleasure at being seen and talked to, but he was aware of the other layers, darker and sadder. The adult Ravenwing who had laid down this record had known how the story ended. She still believed that Urtho had been a good man, and wise in many ways, but she saw his flaws. The danger that he had failed to foresee, and how it had doomed him, and everyone he protected.

_(A shift) _

_Ravenwing stood with the other shamans and elders, under echoing stone. There was a bitter taste in her mouth, and it was hard to breathe through the tightness in her chest. _

_So far there had been only rumours, but Urtho had asked them to come, and from his face, she knew the news was bad. _

_The man had changed little, in the twenty years since she had met him as a child. Still tall and lean, almost stork-like. His hair was perhaps a little more unkempt, his cheeks hollower and less meticulously clean-shaven, and there were new shadows under his eyes, but he seemed well enough, standing in front of all those who represented the Kaled’a’in people who served him. _

_Beside her, others were still murmuring. Urtho cleared his throat, and utter silence fell. _

_“I wish I did not have to tell you this,” he said. “The Palace is lost.” _

_Gasps. Ravenwing felt her knees turn to water. How? They had not been at war long, and it had been going well. Ma’ar’s army could not match Urtho’s greater magic and his gryphons, and even though she was afraid for their future, she had been hopeful, and proud. _

_“It was done by treachery and dark magic,” Urtho said. “Ma’ar placed an artifact known as a dyrstaf. It is a fear-spell – a very clever design, in fact, and this one especially well laid, though it is of course an evil spell.” Stiff at first, uncomfortable in front of his audience, Urtho’s voice was now slipping into its usual dry tones, the way he would lecture to a group, his face distant but his hands animated. “The effects are subtle at first, and so go unnoticed, but over a day it leads to terror and sheer panic, for any who are not shielded. Ma’ar must have planned this carefully; he had the device brought in at dawn a day ago, so that its effects would be mistaken for the anxiety we all expect in ourselves, in a time of war. Overnight it took full effect, and by morning the guards and courtiers alike had fled the Palace and the city. Ma’ar was able to send in a small team of mages and soldiers unremarked, and they moved on the Royal Palace a candlemark before dawn.”_

_Ravenwing closed her eyes, willing herself not to faint. Oh, no, no. _

_“I was warned by Lady Cinnabar,” Urtho went on, “who is a Healer and sleeps under shields, and so was unaffected. She woke to the sound of the attack outside, and she acted bravely, remaining calm and moving to gather the others who had been sufficiently shielded, including some of King Leodhan’s Court mages. They attempted to hold off the attack while they contacted me. They were unsuccessful, and by the time I learned of this, Ma’ar’s mages were able to Gate in a large number of reinforcements.” _

_Ravenwing shuddered, trying to hide her reaction. It was so much worse than she had feared. Something out of a nightmare…_

_It was at this point that Urtho’s voice grew tight. “My advisors…tell me…that it may not be worth the cost it will bear, to re-take the Palace. We will plan, of course, and if there is a way…” _

_Head bowed, for a moment he seemed lost for words, and Ravenwing’s heart broke for him. Urtho had never been meant to fight a war, she thought. He was a peaceful man, a gentle man, not a warrior. _

_“We will see.” Urtho’s face was mask-like, with none of its usual expression, but his voice was steady again. “Lady Cinnabar was able to escape, with the survivors. King Leodhan is among them, though he is…in a bad way, and will need time to recover from this. You know he is not a young man.” _

_Silence. Ravenwing heard feet shuffling, a nervously cleared throat. _

_“In the meantime,” Urtho said stiffly, “it seems that I am the highest-ranked survivor of Leodhan’s Court. General Judeth and the others have informed me that I am in charge, until such time as King Leodhan is well again.” _

Underneath the pain and shock of the moment, re-captured in such intensity, Vanyel could feel the other overtones, Ravenwing’s later knowledge colouring the memory. He knew, as she had known, that King Leodhan had never recovered; Lady Cinnabar had found him hiding in his wardrobe, minutes before the attack party reached the royal suite, and they would never know if it was a weak heart or the shame of it that had killed him. The elderly King had had no sons or heirs, and Urtho had remained commander until the last days of the war.

_Urtho seemed to gather himself. “I know that this is not good news – yes? You have a question?” _

_One of the clan elders had stepped forward. Sundance, she saw, of Trevavyska. “If Ma’ar has taken the Palace,” he said, “then he has your Gates.” _

_Oh. No. Ravenwing should have remembered the permanent Gate-termini in the Palace. In theory, of course, they were a way to allow a counterattack directly into the Palace, but even with as little as she knew of military tactics, she could guess it would be suicide to try that now. If they had only learned sooner… _

_“Yes,” Urtho said. “They cannot use them without the correct keys, yet I would not put it past Ma’ar to discover a way around this. If we do not find a plan to re-take the Palace in the next candlemarks, I must shut down the main terminus before Ma’ar might reach it.” _

_“Shut it down.” Sundance’s voice was flat, hard. “Destructively? If you feed it back on itself–” _

_“No!” The word burst from him. “I would not do that! It would destroy the city.” _

_“Urtho, the city is lost.” _

_“No.” This time the word was quieter, but firm, utter refusal. “I will not. There are innocents in the city, and it is our capital. I will not burn it down for the sake of denying our enemy.” He sagged. “I willshut the Gate down non-destructively at a distance, if it comes to that.” _

_Ravenwing felt her muscles go limp as well, with relief as well as horror. How could Sundance even think of destroying the Royal City? _

Again, Vanyel could sense the later emotions layering around that relief. The older, wearier, more cynical Ravenwing had wondered whether maybe, if Urtho had been more ruthless in the early days of the war, it might have gone differently. After all, in the end his mercy had meant nothing. The Palace had gone up in fire and destruction anyway, and most of Tantara with it, along with Ka'venusho and Urtho’s Tower.

_Ravenwing watched as Urtho struggled to regain his composure again. “I am sorry,” he said. “I did not think that even Ma’ar would move so quickly. But there is still hope.” He gestured around the room. “I have all of you, and your people, and I know your hearts are brave and true. We have the gryphons on our side, which Ma’ar cannot claim. We have our permanent Gates, and need not deal with supply-lines that can be attacked and cut. We have mages, the most skilled in the world, and we have all the people of Tantara, willing to fight for the survival of our Kingdom. With courage and good planning, I believe we can still win this war.” _

_The words stirred Ravenwing’s heart, buoying her, but she could sense the doubts of the others around her. Urtho was no military commander – he was a teacher, a scholar, an engineer and tinkerer. _

_He was clever, she reminded herself, and his knowledge, his inventions and discoveries that Ma’ar did not share, might be the edge that they needed. And surely he would know his limits, and listen to those more experienced commanders, like General Judeth. _

Vanyel drifted in the wash of memory and interpretation; all of this was a story Ravenwing was telling to herself, he thought, trying to fit together the pieces of her life. Urtho had been the best option by far to lead the war, possibly a better leader than the aging King – and it hadn’t been enough. Ma’ar had won by what Urtho would have called treachery and wiles. Ravenwing, older and more jaded, might secretly think that Ma’ar wouldn’t call it that. He would simply have seen it as good strategy, and a seasoned commander like their General Judeth wouldn’t disagree.

_“Ma’ar must not win,” Urtho said, and his voice was hard, his blue eyes like ice. “No matter what, above all else, he must never take this tower. I fear he has become a scourge on the world, and we are the last chance to stop him.” He took a deep breath, shoulders straightening. “And so we will. We can find a way. You are my allies, and my friends, and I trust you with all my heart.” _

_It wasn’t the most rousing speech Ravenwing had ever heard, or the most coherent – her own Clan Elder Silverhorse could have done far better. And yet, it was heartfelt, and it moved her. Urtho, taking up a burden that he had never asked for, because no one else could, because the world needed this of him. _

_Whatever he needed of her, she was his to command, and she was ready. _

Ravenwing’s thoughts were mostly her later analysis, he thought; at the time she had been too deeply shocked to think much at all.

Vanyel was distantly aware that he was in tears again.

_(A shift) _

_Ravenwing found Urtho in his private office. She had known he would be there, even though it was long past midnight; she wasn’t sure when she had last seen him sleep, or eat, in these final desperate days. _

_“Urtho,” she said. _

_That white head lifted. “Shaman Ravenwing shena Taylesederin.” It was the same quicksilver smile she remembered, even now, but it was brief, and then the gloom was in his eyes. “Why are you still here? I told Silverhorse – the evacuation…” _

_“I came to say goodbye.” She took a step closer, then another. “Urtho… Will you not come with us?” _

_“Not yet. Soon.” _

_It was the unspoken lie that hovered between them. She knew Urtho had no intention of leaving, and surely Urtho knew that she knew. Silverhorse had told her of his failsafes on the Tower, and his plan to keep his materials and notes from ever falling into Ma’ar’s hands. Which seemed more important than ever, now. _

_He was unshaven, hair tangled, in robes that he must have slept in, and yet there was still something untouched in him. Some inner core of peace, for all that he was as shaken and horrified as any of them by General Shaiknam’s betrayal. _

_“You need to rest,” she said. _

_Urtho waved a hand. “Soon. Once I know you are out, and safe, and my gryphons as well. Judeth returns with the Fifth, now.” _

_Leaving Urtho with no army. She opened her mouth, to ask what his plan was, exactly – to demand that he let some of them stay to defend – and then closed it. _

_I don’t want to stay, she thought. It was a selfish, cowardly thought hiding in the back of her mind. I want to survive this. _

_Urtho loved his people. He loved his gryphons, the proud, incredible race he had created from magic and imagination, a Great Working that history would never forget. He thought of them almost as his children, and he would never ask them to stay and die in futile defence. _

_Urtho pushed back his stool, and she wanted to tell him not to rise, to save his strength, but he was already reaching for her. He cupped her face between his long-fingered hands, and she closed her eyes, trying not to weep, feeling the tears seep between her eyelids in spite of herself. _

_“You will survive,” he said. “Do that for me, Ravenwing shena Taylesederin. Care for your people, when I cannot.” _

_“I will.” It was all she could do to force the words out. “But – Ma’ar…” She couldn’t ask the question. _

_“All is not lost,” Urtho said. “There is a plan, though I cannot tell you more now.”_

_“Why?” It was a cracked, broken, pointless word._

_“You want to know why Ma’ar is doing this?” A breath. “I cannot tell you. I have only guesses.” For the first time, she heard doubt in his voice. Confusion. “I knew him in his youth, and he was arrogant then – but such things are natural, when one is young and brilliant, brimming over with ideas and plans to change the world. I never thought…” His voice faltered. “I fear perhaps I left him with no better options. Yet he seeks power, and he cannot be allowed to succeed. And so this is how it must end, now, even if I wish it could have been otherwise.” _

_And then he released her face, and pulled her in close to hug her._

_“Be brave, Ravenwing. Go, now.” _

…Vanyel found himself tossed up from the memory, curled into a ball, sobbing. _Damn it, is every single one of these horrible? _He couldn’t even reach for Yfandes.

_Center and ground. _He uncurled, sitting up. “Karna, I’m sorry…”

A whisper in his mind that sounded like Melody. _Van, at some point I’ll convince you to stop apologizing for finding bad things upsetting._

Still, probably most of Karna’s apprentices didn’t start crying uncontrollably after every single historical episode. She had to wonder what was wrong with him.

“No, I am sorry.” He felt her hand on his shoulder. “I should have warned you. Take all the time you need.” A pause. “Do you want to go outside?”

“No…it’s fine…” It was probably freezing cold by now, and he wanted a moment to gather himself before Yfandes flung herself at him. “Is that all?”

“That is all of Ravenwing’s personal memories of Urtho.” Her voice was a little choked as well. “I do not show these ones often. The end is hard to see. I had forgotten.” A sigh. “He died bravely, protecting my ancestors.”

Bravely, sure. Vanyel needed to think more to decide whether or not Urtho had been _smart _about any of it. He had clearly been no kind of match for Ma’ar–

“It’s him,” he whispered. “Ma’ar is Leareth. I’m almost sure. I…recognize his style.” The clever use of trap-spells and artifacts, the cold efficiency – and almost mercy – of emptying the Palace first before attacking. Ravenwing’s thoughts hadn’t contained much detail about what exactly General Shaiknam’s betrayal had entailed, he thought maybe she hadn’t known more, but subterfuge was something Leareth would take full advantage of.

Focus on the mission. If he narrowed down on the details, maybe it would hurt less.

“The plan,” he said. “That Urtho mentioned to Ravenwing. Was that the weapon that we think he used, that…?” He trailed off.

“We have no way of knowing for sure.”

But it was a reasonable guess.

“Urtho seemed like a very kind person,” Vanyel said.

Too kind, maybe, if there were hard but necessary calls that he hadn’t been willing to make.

“Yes. He was a good man.”

He had certainly been a likeable man. Or, at least, that had been Ravenwing’s perception. Her later interpretation. How much might it have been coloured by hindsight?

“How trustworthy are these memories?” Vanyel said. “I mean, Ravenwing made the record years later – decades later, for the first one. And memory isn’t perfect. It’s hard to believe she remembered the exact words that were said in conversations that long ago.”

Karna ducked her head. “Perhaps there were guesses made.”

In which case he ought not to read too much into the precise turns of phrase – probably the gist would be right, or at least the gist as perceived by Ravenwing, but everyone was biased.

Could he guess at what her biases were, and correct from there?

She had felt deep respect for Urtho, that was clear. Her reconstructed memories might paint him in a better light than was justified.

It felt wrong, to be searching for flaws in the character of a man who had died a hero, sacrificing himself to save the people he was supposed to protect – but that didn’t mean it _was _wrong. Vanyel had to be able to look at reality. What he had was third-hand information about Ma’ar, a far younger and less experienced Leareth, filtered through Urtho and then Ravenwing. Both of them would have had their own interpretation on the situation.

So much uncertainty. Any conclusion he could make would be tenuous.

Still better than not knowing anything.

“What else is there?” he said. “I need to see anything that even mentions Ma’ar.”

“Nothing in particular comes to mind.”

“But Ma’ar was one of the most significant figures in your history,” Vanyel prodded. “Almost as much as Urtho. Surely people in the early days had opinions of him, or things they remembered hearing. Even if it’s only hearsay, it would help me to know.” It would be information filtered through people’s particular lenses, but maybe if there were enough pieces, he could account for that.

Karna was silent for a long moment. “You are right. There is surely more, but it will be mixed in amongst the rest. Many, many records.” 

“I would like to see all of them, then. I mean, if you have time to show me.” Vanyel met her eyes steadily. “If I’m to fight him, I have to know his weaknesses, his flaws.”

He was cringing internally, because he knew he was being misleading. _That isn’t why I want to know. _Any specific weakness that the young Ma’ar had suffered, Leareth had surely long-since repaired. It was the hints into his fundamental character that would be informative, and less for fighting him than for deciding whether or not that was the right choice.

At a glance, it didn’t look good – but even Urtho hadn’t been sure he was right to oppose Ma’ar. His final words hadn’t left much of an impression on Ravenwing, Vanyel thought; she had noted them down, but the only real thought or interpretation he had picked up had been her sense that Urtho was so kind, so forgiving, that he struggled to comprehend evil when he saw it.

_I fear perhaps I left him with no better options, _Urtho had said. _Such things are natural, when one is young and brilliant, brimming over with ideas and plans to change the world_. At least, maybe he had said that, or something of that general nature. Ravenwing could have mis-remembered.

Vanyel wouldn’t have described Leareth as arrogant, now. Confident, sure, but arrogant implied a certain mis-calibration, undervaluing others and overestimating oneself. He thought that Leareth had a very accurate sense of his own abilities. Maybe that had come with age and maturity. It was almost impossible to imagine Leareth as a young man, but he had been one, once.

“Karna,” he said. “Urtho said that he knew Ma’ar. They had met before, then?”

“Yes. It is not known for sure, but we believe perhaps Ma’ar trained under Urtho, some twenty years before the final war.”

_Damn it but I wish I had Urtho’s memories as well. _His direct impression of Ma’ar would be so much more useful.

Pointless to wish for; Urtho hadn’t survived to tell his side. He had gone out in a final blaze, hoping to take his enemy with him, and maybe he had been unsure until the very end whether that was the right choice to make, but he had made it.

Tearing apart the world in the process, and if Leareth was right, they hadn’t even faced all of the consequences of it yet. _The ripples will come back to haunt us, _he had said, _and unchecked, they will destroy all civilization. _Leareth blamed himself for it, at least in part.

Urtho’s sacrifice had been for nothing. Ma’ar hadn’t died.

Vanyel’s eyes were burning, and his throat ached around the unshed tears. He wasn’t even sure why it hurt so much.

* * *

Dara was relieved when she recognized the figure standing guard by the stone building, brown robes almost vanishing against the wall.

“Ke’valen!” she called out. “It’s me. Herald Dara.”

“Dara of Valdemar! Come here!”

She jogged over, joining him by the corner.

“You seek your friend Vanyel?” Ke’valen said.

“Yes. I was coming to see if he was almost done with Karna.” It was well past midnight, and she had tired of watching the fire-dancers over at For’ahier Camp.

“Not yet.” Ke’valen lifted a hand, turning two fingers sideways and gauging the angle of the moon. “Soon, I think.”

“Can I join you?”

A broad, toothy smile, very white in the moonlight. “Will you help me stand guard?”

“Of course.” Dara returned his grin, and patted Need at her hip. “Ke’valen, do you have to guard this place all night?”

“For this week, yes.”

“Why?”

He gestured broadly, indicating the arc of the city in front of them – it looked strange at night as well, a flat smear of lights across the whole horizon, nothing rising much higher than a single storey. “Kata’shin’a’in is open to outsiders, and all are welcome. The Old City is not. I must watch.”

“Right. That makes sense.” Dara leaned against the wall behind her; the stone still bore a hint of residual warmth, from the daytime sun.

She hesitated. Ke’valen was Swordsworn. He was someone she could ask, maybe. “Ke’valen?” she said finally. “Can I ask you something?”

“You may.”

“Something happened to me last night.” She closed her eyes, remembering the woman’s blue eyes. “I think I met a _leshy’a Kal’enedral.” _

Ke’valen went very still.

“Is that normal?” she said. “I don’t know what it means.”

“What did she say to you, child?”

Dara folded her arms. “She didn’t actually _say _very much. She just sparred with me until I was tired enough to fall down. I’m still sore. Um, is she going to show up every night now? Because I’m not sure I’m up for more practice right now.” She had walked a lot today, and her feet hurt. “Am I allowed to say no?”

“Usually they will not come to us at all when it is not a good time.” Ke’valen was blinking rapidly. “They have their ways of knowing.”

“Why is she coming to me at all?”

Ke’valen shook his head, solemn. “It is not wise to dispute the decisions of the Powers. They have more ways of enforcement than you have of escape.” And then, to her surprise, a deep chuckle rose from his belly. “I would not turn it down. No learning is ever wasted.” Another laugh.

_I don’t get why it’s funny. _Maybe it was another proverb.

“This is the first I have heard,” Ke’valen admitted, “that a _leshy’a Kal’enedral _will see to an outsider. Perhaps it is no surprise. We are alike, in a way.”

Dara nodded. “She called me _Verkal'enedral_. Do you know what that means?”

A slow nod. “‘Ver’ is white, so it means simply a Sworn One who wears white. Though you are not dedicated to our Goddess as Warrior – but you are sworn to a Power, no?”

“Not a god,” Dara clarified. “I mean, we take the Heralds’ Oath, but that’s just to the monarch and to Valdemar.”

“Ah.” Ke’valen leaned back, a cryptic look in his eyes.

Dara was silent as well, nibbling at a piece of loose skin on her lower lip; half her face seemed to be peeling off, in this dry air. She wasn’t sure if it was appropriate to ask. Then again, Ke’valen seemed quite friendly, and hard to offend. “Ke’valen?” she said finally. “What does it really _mean_, to be Swordsworn? How did you end up being one? Vanyel says it happens when you go on blood feud…”

* * *

“Hmm, Melody?” Shavri said, lifting her head from the notes in front of her. “Is it about Jisa?”

She was in the office of the King’s Own, working late again, because Tran was having one of his bad days and someone needed to prepare for the damned Council meeting in the morning. Damn it, she missed Dara. None of them had realized how much work the girl had been quietly taking on.

_She’ll be a good King’s Own. _After her journey, they might as well promote her directly to full Whites, no point in shoving her back in classes.

“No, it’s not about Jisa,” Melody said. “Or only indirectly.” A pause. “Shavri, I’ve already talked to Aber and he approved this. I want to volunteer to go north.”

“What?”

“Can I sit?” Melody didn’t wait for a response, just left the door ajar and pulled out the chair that was usually Tran’s. “It makes sense for me to go. You wanted to send a Mindhealer. I’m one of the most experienced. I could use a change of pace, and Terrill would be delighted to be assigned to Haven again. He’s not really needed down south anymore.”

A change of pace. _You’re bored, aren’t you? _Melody had never been in one place for this long before.

“What about Jisa’s lessons?” Shavri said, frowning.

Melody’s hands darted in front of her, smoothing down her collar. “Honestly, if thought there was any chance you’d agree to it, I’d ask to take her with me.”

“No.” The word seemed to fall with a thud between them. “Melody, you can’t think – she’s only eleven!”

“That’s what I thought.” Melody’s eyes flashed to the window, the desk covered with papers, then back to Shavri’s face. “Well, she can apprentice with Terrill while I’m gone. It’ll do her good, to learn from someone else for a while, Terrill has a very different style.” One shoulder rose and fell. “I’ve taught her all I can when it comes to theory, anyway. What she needs now is hands-on experience.”

Shavri nodded, though she was still dubious. “Melody… I wish you wouldn’t go, but if it’s what you want, I won’t try to stop you.”

“Thank you.” The Mindhealer smiled.

“I get it. You’re bored.” Shavri shook her head. “How much of that is just because Vanyel isn’t around anymore?”

Melody only gave her a mild look, and said nothing.

It had probably been an inappropriate question to ask.


	12. Chapter Twelve

Vanyel had woken with the morning light yet again, and spent a while lying with the blankets pulled over his head, fruitlessly trying to go back to sleep. It had been a project doomed to failure, and he had eventually dredged up the energy to get out of bed, put on a tunic, haul himself out of the tent, and make his way to Jor'ethan clan tent for a cup of chava and a bread-roll. He felt a little better after that, but his head still ached and his eyes were itchy and watering.

He was mostly shielding Yfandes out from his surface thoughts, because he didn’t especially feel like listening to her nag him about getting more rest. It wasn’t his fault that the damned memory tapestries had to be viewed after moonrise, forcing him to stay up unreasonably late. He would try to nap in the afternoon.

Dara was awake by the time he returned to the tent, or at least part of the way there; she was sitting up in her bedroll, hair a mess of spikes, staring vaguely into the distance and not doing anything in particular. She had waited up for him again last night, and even kept him company while he forced himself to stay awake long enough to take some quick initial notes, but she seemed to be much better at sleeping in. Damned youngsters.

“Morning,” she said, yawning.

Vanyel nodded to her, replacing the tent-flap and settling down cross-legged on his own bedroll. It was a relief to be behind walls, even if they were made of thin canvas – the constant crush of people made him feel like he was suffocating under the weight of their eyes.

He set his second cup of chava in front of him. “Dara, we have to talk.”

“What is it?”

He took a breath, let it out. “We need to stay here longer than I’d been hoping. Karna thinks it might take as much as a month to show me all the records that are relevant to Ma’ar.”

Dara smiled at him. “That’s fine. I don’t mind it here.”

“That isn’t the problem.” _He _minded the prospect of staying in Kata’shin’a’in much longer, but that wasn’t the point either. “We’re running low on coin. It’s my fault, I’m afraid I underestimated the cost of traveling outside Valdemar and didn’t leave enough safety margin.” Which had been stupid. He really had thought he was planning for the worst-case scenario. “I calculated it, and even if we spend only the bare minimum on tent-fees and grain, we can only stay another three weeks – and that’s leaving us very little to make it back through Jkatha.”

Dara’s eyes were more alert now. “What do we do?”

Vanyel sighed. “My thought was that I stay here, and you ride back to the Rethwellan border and request a loan. You can offer a promissory note, to redeem on our border. I think the Border-Guard will accept that, and if not, certainly someone in Petras will.”

Dara’s eyes widened. “But that would take weeks.”

“I don’t see that we’ve got a better option.” He shook his head. “I am sorry, Dara. I know you were enjoying it here.”

“That’s not why–” Her eyes narrowed. “I’m not being _selfish_. I’m worried about you being alone.”

Vanyel felt his shoulders tightening. “I’m an adult, Dara. I can look after myself for a few weeks.” He didn’t especially want to be alone here either, but if he went with Dara, they would be wasting precious time – and traveling didn’t sound any more appealing than staying here.

Dara folded her arms. “I have another idea.”

“Go on.”

“One of us could get a job here.” She smiled brightly. “Obviously me, so you can focus on what you’re doing.” 

“Oh.” For a moment all he could do was stare at her.

“There’s lots of work here,” Dara went on, apparently oblivious to his shock. “Even a menial job would pay enough to cover our stay, but I had a better thought. I know how to fight and I have Need. I’ve already made friends with some mercenaries and one troop tried to recruit me. I was thinking I could use them as a reference, get a gig escorting some wealthy merchants home to the Border with Velvar. Ideally women, that way Need would definitely help me if we were attacked. It’s a lot closer than Rethwellan. I know what’s normal to charge and since I have my own horse, and Rolan can keep up Shin’a’in-bred horses with no trouble, I could charge a _lot _of gold for it. Especially if I can prove I have a magic sword.” She grinned. “Then if I wanted, I could come right back – or I could spend some of the coin I collected on trade-goods that are cheaper in Velvar than here. And I could sign onto _another _caravan coming back and get paid for that too.” Her eyes went distant for a moment, a calculating look. “If I did all of those things, I could earn at least a hundred Jkathan _daari–” _the name of the gold coin, in their currency, “–and it would _still _be faster than going to the Border with Rethwellan.”

Vanyel felt his eyes widened. A hundred Jkathan gold pieces would cover their living costs in Kata’shin’a’in for three months, generously.

“And _then _I could get a job doing something else here,” Dara went on, cheerfully, “and even if it’s not a very good job, it could cover us living here, so we could spend all of that gold on the return journey. Or just keep it.”

Vanyel grimaced. “Dara, you don’t have to–”

“I don’t mind. It’ll be fun.” She ran a hand over her hair, only succeeding at making it stick up more. “I don’t feel great about leaving you here, even for a week or two, but you’ve got Yfandes, and Rolan can Mindspeak that distance.”

“I’ll be fine.” That wasn’t the problem. “Dara, I’m not sure what it’ll do for the reputation of Heralds, you hiring out as a mercenary…”

“Don’t see what’s wrong with earning an honest living.” Dara made a face. “I’ll be very professional, and probably I won’t even have to fight, I’d be mostly there as a deterrent.” She sighed. “If it makes you feel better, I won’t wear Whites.”

“No, that’d be dishonest.” Vanyel brought both hands to his temples and pressed in, hard, wishing the headache would ease. “What does Rolan think of the plan?”

“He thinks it’s a clever idea,” Dara said.

Vanyel closed his eyes. _:Yfandes, is that right?: _

A mental chuckle. _:She’s telling the truth. And I think it’s a fine plan. I wouldn’t have thought of it either, but…well, maybe that’s our blind spot: _

_:What do you mean?: _

_:Just that you’ve never had to work for a living: _

That felt a little unfair. He had worked awfully hard over the last fifteen years.

_:Being a Herald isn’t the same. The King provides for you – your food and shelter isn’t directly tied to how well you manage on a given day. Dara grew up in poverty. She was managing her mother’s laundry-business at ten years old: _

That was an odd thought. _:Hmm. Maybe: _It still seemed…distasteful, somehow. But maybe Yfandes was right, and that was just his bias. If Rolan approved, he couldn’t exactly say anything against it.

“Well?” Dara interrupted. “What do you think?”

Vanyel rubbed his eyes. _Come on, wake up. _“I think it’s a good idea, and I’m proud of you for thinking of it.”

Dara lit up, practically glowing. “Really?”

“Really.”

She sat quietly for a moment, beaming to herself, and then stood. “I think I’ll wash up and then go to the bazaar. Can I get you anything?”

He didn’t have to be quite so careful with spending, if she was going to earn more gold for them. “Can you pick me up some more paper? Or parchment, if they don’t have it. I’m running out of space for my notes.”

“Of course. And another cup of chava?”

“Please.”

* * *

Shavri closed her eyes. “All right. I’m ready.”

She could feel the glow of Jisa’s mind, at her elbow, quiet reassurance, offering up her Sight. Savil was there, mage-sight at the ready, and Stef was sitting sideways in an armchair with his legs swinging over one arm. Just observing, for this part – he had done his work for tonight already.

They were in Randi’s bedroom rather than her own, because her lifebonded hadn’t felt up for going outside and walking to Healers’; he had cancelled half of his meetings today, and taken the rest from his bed. They ought to see about getting him some kind of comfortable padded sofa that would look a little more professional, she thought, making mental note of it.

In the end, after months of making no progress in figuring out Stef’s Gift, there had been two breakthroughs. One had been asking Savil to step in as well, sharing her mage-sight; she was the only Herald-Mage who had the trick of it, though Moondance would have done just as well.

The other had been to Look at _Randi, _instead of Stef. She had been so focused on what was going on in the Bardic trainee’s mind, the workings of his strange Wild Gift – but in the end it wasn’t the Gift itself she hoped to duplicate, just its effects.

Shavri thought she understood it now. They were about to find out if she was right.

Sitting in a comfortable chair next to the bed, she reached out and took Randi’s hand in hers. Lean into Healing-Sight, opening her shields fully.

Jisa’s Sight overlaid hers, familiar now – sometimes, lately, she almost forgot which Sight was her own and which belonged to her daughter.

It was more difficult to merge Savil’s mage-sight with her own, they weren’t as practiced, but after thirty seconds of effort she was able to stabilize it. The world opened into new colours-that-weren’t-colours, vibrant flows of energy.

Reach out to her lifebonded… _:Randi, relax: _His life-energy and his mind were too turbulent; she needed him to hold still, for this. _:Go into trance, all right?: _

Wordless acknowledgement, and she felt how he turned inward on himself. It took a long time for his aura to settle; Randi wasn’t very experienced with inducing trance in himself, since he wasn’t strongly Gifted and had never had much reason to practice.

Finally, the rippling currents that were Randi slowed, and she thought she could see the right pathways clearly enough. Shavri reached in with her Gift, a feather-light touch. Here, and here, and here…

Not quite.

After the first three tries failed, Shavri had to take a moment to center and ground, breathing deeply and letting the frustration melt away, before she was ready to join the Sight-meld again.

Randi, distracted, had lost the stillness of trance.

_:Try again: _she sent, gently and patiently. It wouldn’t help to make him feel he was doing something wrong.

It took even longer the second time – Randi was tired, in pain, starting to lose focus, and so was she.

Lay her Gift on him, softly. Here and here and here.

_:Oh: _She felt it through the lifebond, in the moment it took effect.

–And lost it seconds later, both of them startled out of the trance-state.

_:You did it!: _Randi sent, awe in his mindvoice.

_:I did it: _Even if it had just been for a second. _:This is going to take a lot of practice: _Eventually, with enough practice and familiarity, she ought to be able to find the places she needed to touch with Healing-Sight and memory alone, which would make it a little more feasible – pulling in Savil and her daughter every time she needed to block Randi’s pain wouldn’t be sustainable in the long run.

_:I need a break: _she sent, opening her eyes and releasing the meld.

“I felt that,” she heard Stef say. “I think you got it. Congratulations.”

He was trying to sound cheerful, Shavri thought, but there was tension in his voice.

“Just for a second,” she said. “It’s very hard to maintain.”

“You’ll get the hang of it, I’m sure.” Stef ducked his head. “So… I guess you don’t need me anymore.”

“No!” Was that what he was worried about? Shavri pasted a reassuring smile onto her lips. “Stef, we still need you. For one, I’m not sure I’ll _ever _be able to get this to work without both of us in trance, and that’s hardly conducive to meetings and audiences. This is progress, but we need you as much as ever.”

“Oh.” He was trying not to look relieved, but she caught a hint of it anyway.

“The good news,” Savil said dryly, “is that if we can get this to work reliably – especially if Shavri can teach any of the other Healers – we can keep Randi free of pain all the time, without putting an unsustainable load on you, Stef.” 

“Right.” Stef swung himself upright in the chair. “That makes sense.” He flashed a smile at Savil, and stood. “Calls for celebration. Can I get you a drink?”

“That would be lovely. Good lad.”

“Healer Shavri?”

“Yes, please.” Shavri leaned back in her chair, feeling some of the tension in her neck start to unwind. There was a glow in her chest. _I did it. _

Not enough, never enough, but something.

* * *

Vanyel lay on his back, staring dully at the ridge of the tent. For once he had managed to doze off again after waking with the dawn, and it was the later heat that had woken him – Kata’shin’a’in was only growing hotter as Midsummer approached, in the daytime at least, the nights were as cold as ever. He had reversed his weather-barrier, and the air inside the tent was cooling, but he was still sticky with drying sweat. And now he definitely couldn’t get back to sleep.

_Get up, _he thought, but the problem was, he couldn’t find the will to move either.

He had been in Kata’shin’a’in for…ten days? Maybe as much as two weeks. He could figure it out by looking back at his notes, but the nights were blurring together and he was losing track of time.

Though he was doing his best to manage it, the late nights hadn’t ever gotten much easier. Sometimes he was able to nap for a candlemark or two in the late afternoons, but it never felt very restful.

At Yfandes’ insistence, just to get her to stop nagging him, Vanyel had finally told Karna he would skip one night in four in order to go to bed early. Two nights ago had been the first, and he had collapsed into his bedroll as soon as the sun was below the horizon, and slept like the dead until dawn.

Last night had involved a particularly violent memory of a battle – rather, not a direct memory, but the events as described to Ravenwing by one of the survivors. Still gruesome enough, because Ravenwing had apparently had a vivid imagination, and had seen enough battles to picture this one. Fresh material for nightmares, and Vanyel’s sleep had been broken and uneasy.

His head ached fiercely, and he was thirsty and needed to use the latrines. _Pull yourself together, Herald. _He had gone longer on less sleep than this, during the war; he could weather it.

Maybe the problem was that he was getting older, and didn’t bounce back the same way anymore. The war had been five years ago, after all, when he was still in his twenties.

_I’m losing my touch. _Here he was, thinking he had a chance against Leareth, and he couldn’t even make himself get out of bed. He hadn’t even succeeded at taking notes, last night; he had fallen asleep with the pen in his hand.

It felt hopeless. The more he learned, the more it seemed that even the young, inexperienced Ma’ar would have had him outmatched. How was he possibly supposed to fight the version of Ma’ar that had two thousand years of practice?

Maybe there was no choice but to try for an alliance, or be crushed.

Randi was counting on him. Trusting him. He had to live up to that trust…

_I can’t. I’m not good enough. _

Vanyel rolled over, digging his palms into his eye sockets until spots danced against the darkness of his eyelids. That line of thinking led nowhere useful.

_You’re just tired_. _Stop being maudlin. _Fatigue would make him pessimistic; that didn’t mean his gloomy thoughts were reality.

Though, really, how did he know he wasn’t being pessimistic enough? Some situations just _were _that dire. He couldn’t claim that every pessimistic thought was exhaustion and loneliness talking.

Maybe it had been too late from the very beginning. The gods had picked the wrong person, to walk his path. He was too broken. Not good enough.

_Stop it. _The endless, pointless loop was familiar, and Vanyel tried to step back from it, to remember that it was in his head, it wasn’t the world, but he couldn’t find the edges of it. There was only fog.

And the void, lurking behind it. _‘Lendel, ashke, I don’t know if I can do this. _

How exactly was talking to himself, to the dead memory of his lifebonded, supposed to help?

He needed a distraction. _:’Fandes?: _he sent.

_:You’re awake!: _A pause. _:Van, love, are you all right?: _

_:Just tired: _He tried to return her wash of affection. _:I miss you: _

_:I’ll be right there: _

Vanyel sat up, wincing as the band of pain behind his forehead tightened. He was dizzy, and despite the reverse weather-barrier, the tent still felt too warm. He needed to go refill his waterskin at the public well, but he wasn’t sure he could brave the midday heat. _:’Fandes, I don’t feel well: _

_:I was getting that sense: _Concern leaked across their bond. _:I really don’t like the overtones I’m picking up from you, Van: _

_:I meant physically: _His body felt clammy all over.

_:Hmm: _A moment later, Vanyel felt the gentle squeezing sensation that was Yfandes trying to slip fully into his mind. He dropped his shields and let her.

_:Oh: _Her worry sharpened. _:No, love, you aren’t well: _A pause. _:Have you been eating and drinking enough?: _

_:I thought so: _He had refilled his waterskin at least twice yesterday. It wasn’t very appealing; the water came up from the well lukewarm and tasting strongly of minerals. Chava tasted much better, and it was a liquid as well; he had drunk four cups of it yesterday.

Disapproval. _:Chosen, you can’t keep using chava to replace sleep: _

_:I’m not. I slept enough last night: _He wished she would stop nagging him.

_:No, you didn’t: _There was irritation in her mindvoice now. _:Van, the days are getting shorter and shorter. I counted, it’s only about eight candlemarks between sunset and dawn, and you’re not going to bed until four or five candlemarks after sunset. So you’re sleeping four candlemarks at most, on the nights that you view the tapestries: _

_:Oh: _He hadn’t even thought about how long the nights were – he never had any idea what time it was, Kata’shin’a’in didn’t have bells, there was no way to know the time except to look at the sky. _:But I went back to sleep today: _

_:For two candlemarks, maybe. Still not enough: _Her mindvoice was tart. _:You’re skipping tonight and taking it easy: _

_:But–:_

She cut him off with a mental shove. _:No buts. Be sensible, love. I want you to go fill up your waterskin and drink all of it, and then have a proper meal, and then find a Healers’ tent and pick up some herbs to help you sleep tonight: _Another pause. _:And I’m going to try for Rolan, and tell Dara not to dawdle:_

_:No, don’t–:_

_:Stop it: _There was no anger in the words, but the ringing steel was there all the same. _:Chosen, listen to me. If you aren’t going to take care of yourself, I’m going to have to tell Dara to drop whatever she’s doing and come back: _

Vanyel sighed. _:Don’t do that. I’ll take today off and rest: _Not that he was going to enjoy it. He didn’t have nearly enough distractions in the tent. _:Wasn’t there a stall in the bazaar selling herb-mixes?: _That felt easier than finding a Healer, and would probably cost less – a Healer would want to poke and prod at him and charge extra for it, which Vanyel wasn’t in the mood for.

_:Now you’re thinking ahead: _A touch of approval.

He was eight hundred miles from home, alone in a city of strangers, and it was starting to feel like their journey would never end. Like every night would be awful, horrifying stories of dead strangers’ lives, and the nightmares that followed, forever.

_:Van, you know that isn’t true: _He could feel Yfandes trying to pour her light into his mind, and it was almost enough, but not quite. _:It will end. We’ll get through this. Together: _

_:I know: _And maybe it would be enough. Or maybe it wouldn’t, and he was already doomed to repeat Urtho’s history, he would go north and turn the horizon to fire, blot out twenty years of Leareth’s work, yet another pointless waste of lives and in the end it would all be for nothing.

_Think about something else. _Vanyel heard Yfandes’ hoofbeats outside, ringing like bells on the hard-packed dirt, and he started to reach for his shirt and then shrugged and just stood up. He wouldn’t be the first person in Kata’shin’a’in to go about half-naked in the heat, and on the short walk to the well, he ought not to burn too badly.

Standing made him dizzy again, and his head felt ready to explode. _I don’t understand why I feel like this. _He could barely think.

Yfandes send a wave of soothing reassurance. _:I think it’s just the heat. Though if you’re not feeling better after getting some fluids down, I’m taking you to the Healers: _

_:I’ll be good and drink the gross water: _He didn’t quite trust it, so he was using magic to sterilize it every time. Which didn’t make it taste any better.

The bright sunlight left him half-blind for a moment, as he stumbled out into the baking heat, but it was a relief to feel Yfandes’ nose butting at his face.

_:Get on: _she sent. _:I’ll take you there: _

_:I can walk–:_

_:You can, but you don’t have to. I’m here:_

* * *

“Thank you, lady Herald,” the woman said, clasping both of Dara’s hands. “You’re a fine young woman, you know.”

“You’re welcome. It was my pleasure.” Dara nodded, almost a bow. She had in fact genuinely enjoyed escorting Eskarina Trattar, a wealthy gem-merchant from Velvar, and her husband. They weren’t nobles, but had made their own fortune, and she liked their straightforward pragmatism. And how well they treated their horses, both fine Shin’a’in-bred mares.

They hadn’t run into any trouble on the road – the hardest part of it had been dissuading Need from dragging her off on side-errands, when the last thing she wanted to do was draw attention to herself or delay their trip. Dara had a _job _to do, after all.

She had a heavy satchel full of gold and silver, carefully concealed at the bottom of her saddlebags, and she had purchased some gems from Lady Trattar – at a steep discount – which she was keeping in a pouch against her skin.

The journey out hadn’t been as enjoyable; she had signed on with a contingent of merchants and their wives, and none of them seemed to have anything like common sense. Still, it had been uneventful; they had stayed at well-guarded inns, and she had only once needed to fend off a thief in one of the larger cities, who had quickly decided to look for easier prey. Mostly it was as she had told Vanyel – she was there to look dangerous, her sword clearly visible and daggers peeking from her sleeves. Merchants traveling quickly on horseback, without carriages or baggage-trains, weren’t the most appealing targets anyway.

Her _leshy’a Kal’enedral, _whose name she still didn’t know, had showed up perhaps one night in three, with no warning at all – and with good timing, picking moments when they could spar unobserved. She barely ever spoke a world, only threw Dara around like so much cordwood until she collapsed from sheer fatigue. _She’s worse than Kayla. _It was probably good, in the end – she had been getting out of shape, before, and she was learning fast.

All in all, the journey had taken exactly two weeks, and once Dara sold the gems, she ought to have the equivalent of a hundred and twenty gold Jkathan _daari. _For work that hadn’t even been that hard. She had asked Rolan if it was reasonable of her to spend some of that coin on things she wanted at the bazaar – she had_ earned _it, after all – and he had seemed amused, and said of course she could treat herself a little.

She was almost tempted to drop off the coin with Vanyel, turn right back around, and do it again – except that Rolan had passed on to her that Yfandes was a little worried. Probably better for her to stick around and make sure Vanyel was taking care of himself.

Dara would have liked to have spent more time with Eskarina, but instead she took her leave, offered her best wishes for good profits, and extracted herself, as quickly as she could without being rude, promising that she would be in Kata’shin’a’in for the next few days and would come by their room at the inn to visit.

Rolan was waiting outside the inner city by the water-trough, majestic and untouched by road-dust – as usual, Dara felt a swell of pride, seeing him looking so fine next to the other horses.

She went up and leaned her forehead against his, stroking his mane. It was midway through the afternoon, and even hotter than she remembered, it couldn’t be long until Midsummer now, but Dara thought she was getting acclimatized to the southern climate. The near-desert dryness was much better than the stifling humidity further into Jkatha, anyway.

_:Where’s Vanyel?: _she sent.

A short pause. _:Yfandes says he’s in the tent taking notes: _Rolan sent.

_:All right. Pass on that I’m headed that way. Ask him if he wants anything from the bazaar or the food-stands: _She couldn’t actually hear the coins jingling in her saddlebags, but she was still very aware of that pouch – for the first time in her life, she felt _rich_, and it was a pleasant feeling.

_:Don’t go overboard, love: _Rolan sent. _:You are a Herald, not a gem-merchant: _A hint of pride. _:Though you haggle as well as any merchant I have met: _

_:Thank you: _Dara checked the straps on his saddle, making sure nothing had slipped, and then swung herself up.

_:Vanyel would like some chava and something other than travel-bread to eat: _Rolan sent a moment later.

_:Of course: _

It was nearly a candlemark later that Dara finally reached their small tent-plot. The sun was sliding down the sky, and the wind had picked up, blowing dust into her eyes. She didn’t see Yfandes; the other Companion had probably gone to find an open pasture that still had any grass left in it, or somewhere sheltered from the sun and wind.

She had bought a clever wooden travel-cup with a lid that fit neatly over the top, and then filled it up for free at Jor’ethan – the Shin’a’in boy she had befriended there had been delighted to see her. Dara was also the proud owner of three new scarves and a necklace, and she had inquired about renting a temporary stall to sell her gems, though she wanted to come back in the morning and talk the price down a bit more. Gods, it was fun; she half wished she could live here forever, instead of going back to Haven with its interminable Council meetings and treasury reports.

No one lived here forever, she reminded herself, except maybe the shamans. There was just over a month of trading season left, and then the clans would start to pack up and drift back to their nomadic lives on the Plains, and the city would, as they put it, ‘dry up and blow away’.

Dara took a few minutes to remove Rolan’s tack, in the lee of one of the larger nearby tents, and give him a very quick rub-down. She had bought more grain for him, and she intended to treat him to a hot mash tonight – he had earned the coin almost as much as her, after all.

Rolan snuffled at her hair. _:I appreciate the gratitude. You go rest now, Chosen. You did well: _

The tent-flapped was closed, firmly tied down. Dara tapped on it. “Vanyel? It’s me.”

“Be right there.” His voice was muffled. She heard his feet shuffling, and then the flap lifted. “Welcome back. Come in. Good journey?”

“It was wonderful. I brought you chava.” She held out the cup. “And a pastry, just a minute, it’s in my saddlebag.”

“Thank you.” He took it from her, and held the canvas out of the way so that she could duck inside, then quickly pulled it down and re-fastened the ties. “Sorry, just trying to keep the dust out.”

The tent was pleasantly cool compared to the searing sun outside. Dara flopped down onto her bedroll, basking in it, and examined Vanyel out of the corner of her eye, trying not to be obvious about it. Shirtless in the heat, he didn’t look as bad as she had feared, hearing that Yfandes was worried; she didn’t think he had lost any more weight. Still, there were dark shadows under his eyes, it didn’t look like he had shaved in days – until now she would never have put ‘Vanyel’ and ‘scruffy’ in the same sentence – and there wasn’t much expression in his voice.

She watched as he settled onto the bedroll, moving stiffly, and took a deep pull from his cup. _I don’t understand why he likes that stuff. _She had tried it, and it made her intolerably jittery.

His hand was shaking a little, she noticed. There were scrolls of parchment all around him, weighted down with small rocks to hold them open – it was a lot easier to find here than regular paper.

Dara finally sat up, extracted the pastry from her saddlebags, and then started pulling out her dirty Whites and throwing them into the corner. She could take them to the public washing-trough later – or, no, she could pay someone to wash them properly, just the once. Surely she had earned that much luxury.

Vanyel munched at the pastry. “Oh. This is good. Thank you, Dara.” He lifted his eyes to meet hers. “Tell me about your adventures?”

Dara had meant to ask him how he was doing, but if he wanted to hear about her journey, she wasn’t going to turn that down. “It was _so_ good. I met a gem-merchant called Lady Eskarina Trattar, and her husband, but she’s really the brains behind it…”

She talked for nearly a candlemark, while Vanyel made the appropriate listening noises. He seemed genuinely impressed by her success, and that felt even better than Rolan’s pride. She had never thought she could do anything to earn Herald-Mage Vanyel Demonsbane’s congratulation.

Finally, it occurred to her that the conversation was very one-sided. “How about you?” she said, sitting back on her bedroll. “Are you learning lots?”

“You could say that.” Vanyel gestured at his pile of notes. “Plenty that isn’t relevant, but some is.”

“Mmm.” Dara was very curious, but Vanyel didn’t seem that interested in explaining more right now. “How much longer do you think it’s going to take, to see all of it?”

He shrugged. “It’s taking longer because Yfandes wants me to skip every other night and go to bed early. Maybe another week or two. I’m trying to talk her down to every third night, I don’t want to be here forever.”

He sounded so weary. Dara chewed her lip. “Are you managing all right?” she said finally. “I know you don’t like it very much here.”

“It’s fine.” Vanyel’s voice was closed-off, inviting no further questions.

“If you say so.” She watched him for a moment longer, as the silence stretched on. “Are you going tonight?” she said finally.

“I took last night off, so yes.” A heavy sigh. “Though it’s almost the new moon, so the tapestries aren’t active. Karna said she would just talk me through some of the stories.”

“All right. I’ll wait up for you and I can help you take notes.” She lay down on her bedroll. “I’m taking a nap now.” She was invited back to Jor’ethan for a party tonight, and she wanted to be rested for it.

* * *

_:!: _

Savil woke to the familiar tug of the Web, and rolled over, not bothering to cast a mage-light. _:What?: _

Information flooded her senses, Valdemar spreading out in her mind. At one point she had needed a map spread out in front of her, to recognize what the Web was telling her, but now it came automatically.

Except that she didn’t recognize this particular bearing. _:Where?: _she tried to clarify.

North.

Oh.

Savil groaned and sat up, cupping a tiny mage-light in her palm. _:What’s the problem?: _She was already swinging her legs over the side of the bed. There ought to be a map in the drawer under her desk.

Magic. The Web was still trying to zero in on it, the alarm that the _vrondi _were calling, but it had the tang of blood-power.

Settling into her chair with a groan – her back was always stiff after sleeping, especially when she was woken suddenly – Savil felt around for the drawer. She was already pulling herself into the Web, Reaching with Thoughtsensing and mage-sight fully open.

Her bleary eyes struggled to focus on the paper, through the dizzying confusion of Othersenses, hers and not-hers.

There!

Rutherford. A tiny blot on the map – a village on the North Trade Road, or at least on the narrower, un-maintained gravel track that it became north of the former Border, it wouldn’t be a real road for years yet.

Fully alert now, Savil closed her eyes, and flung herself headfirst into the Web. Without it, she was nowhere near a strong enough Thoughtsenser to reach that far, but the Web scaffolded her, and the full power of the Heartstone throbbed in the back of her mind.

Zeroing in on the alarm-source, she found a cluster of minds, several hundred of them, panic wafting from their surface thoughts. No Thoughtsensers.

The nearest Herald was…oh. The Web offered her answer almost before she had formed the question. Tera. Riding circuit, currently near Westmark, about fifty miles away. Asleep.

But she was Mindspeaker, strong enough to be on the relay; all of the Heralds sent north on circuit were strong Mindspeakers with a range of at least fifty miles.

_:Herald Tera: _she sent. _:Wake up. Tera: _

She felt the woman come awake. _:Who?:_

_:Savil. Web-alarm. Go to Rutherford: _

_:What is it?: _The other Herald still felt bleary.

_:Bloodpath mage, I think. I’ll get it, but I need someone to clean up: _

_:Oh: _A pause. _:I’ll ride out now: _

Tera wouldn’t be there until morning. That was fine.

Savil let the Web pull her in to the alarm-source again. No Thoughtsensers, but some of those minds had the glow of the mage-gifted.

It was always weird, trying to act at a distance when all the information she had was through Thoughtsensing and mage-sight; no picture, only the haziest sense of what was going on. She had a scrying-focus, but that took time to set up. Vanyel had it much easier, with his Farsight – though even he had needed to rely on scrying or his other Gifts, during the period when his Farsight had been unreliable due to Melody’s block.

There. That particular mind _reeked _of blood-magic. In an ideal world, maybe Savil would have tried to get more information before killing someone out of hand, but the Web had raised an alarm, the villagers were terrified, and no one who was ethical – almost no one – would be using blood-power in the first place.

Through the Web, she aimed a levinbolt, and let it go.

The mind winked out.

Savil spent a few more minutes watching, trying to either find another mage or figure out if there were non-Gifted attackers. It was hard to be sure, though – at this distance, even with the Web amplifying, she could catch only the faintest shreds of surface thoughts from the non-Gifted – and the fear in the villagers’ minds was fading, replaced by determination. They seemed to have turned the tide of the attack.

_:Good enough?: _she asked the Web. Sometimes it had opinions.

This time, there was only a sort of wordless assent.

Savil pulled back, falling into her own body with a thud. _Ow_. There hadn’t been much time to prepare, and a reaction-headache was already starting behind her eyes.

She sat for a moment, catching her breath, and then stood up and made her way unsteadily out into the living room. Probably there was still some willowbark tincture in her cabinet; she tried to be careful with the stuff, it gave her an upset stomach, but it would hit fast enough that she could go back to sleep.

She was still puttering around looking for wine to mix it with, when it hit her.

_They’re in the Web. _

A slow smile spread across her face. She had been right.

* * *

The firelight warmed her skin, casting everything in warm flickering light. Dara danced, eyes half-closed, feet moving to the beat.

She wasn’t sure she had ever had so much fun in her whole life. Her friend at Jor’ethan, hearing of her success as a mercenary and amateur gem-trader, had insisted on a celebration. Dara was tipsy, and not just from ale, there had been something else in the drink he had handed her. It made her feel warm and tingly, like she was floating, and more alive than she ever had before.

She didn’t know the words to any of the songs, but that didn’t matter at all, she could still find the beat and dance.

_:Dara:_

For a moment, Rolan’s mindvoice barely registered. Dara was a thousand miles away, soaring above the plains on wings of fire.

_:Dara: _A hard mental shove that made her stumble, losing the beat. _:Chosen!: _

_:What?: _Dara caught herself, blinking, and backed up against the wall of the tent, moving out of the way of the other dancers.

_:Can you check on Vanyel, please?: _

_:Is he back already?: _Vanyel didn’t usually finish with the Scrollsworn until well after midnight, and she had thought that wouldn’t be for ages.

_:He has been for a candlemark. You lost track of time, love: _

_:Oh: _She groaned. _:Do I have to? Can’t I just talk to him in the morning?: _She was having such a good time, and her new friends would be sad if she left in the middle of the party.

_:Chosen, please: _Just a hint of steel in Rolan’s mindvoice.

_:Oh, all right: _Dara couldn’t help the sliver of petulance. It seemed awkward to interrupt the dancing to say goodbye, so she just slipped out of the tent, into the cold air. It did clear her head, and it caught up to her that she had probably been rude.

She reached out, apologetic. _:Rolan, I’m sorry I wasn’t listening: _

_:I know you were enjoying yourself, Chosen. I am sorry to interrupt: _

_:Rolan, what’s wrong?: _

_:I am not sure. Yfandes says Vanyel is shielding her out, but not asleep. She told me she was worried: _

Oh. Dara stumbled, tripping over a stone she hadn’t seen in the darkness; damn it, she was drunk and tired and the last thing she wanted was to be dealing with Vanyel’s problems. _Why now? _

–She wasn’t being very compassionate about it. _Don’t be childish, _she ordered herself. _Get your head together. _

Rolan caught up to her at the crossroads – well, cross-path – and she rested a hand on his neck as they walked. By the time she reached their tent, which wasn’t far, she had sobered up somewhat. Yfandes was prancing around outside, ears flattened back; her eyes lighted on Dara, bright blue even in the darkness. Dara knocked on the flap again, and when there was no answer, she reached under to undo the ties.

“Vanyel?”

It was dark inside, no mage-light to be seen, and cold; apparently he hadn’t set up a weather-barrier either. Dara could just barely see Vanyel’s silhouette; he was sitting on his bedroll, head in his hands, a curled-up ball of tension and misery.

“Hey.” She lowered the flap, leaving it unfastened, and crossed the two yards to him. “Vanyel, are you all right?”

“I’m fine.” His voice was hoarse and nasal; he had been crying.

“I don’t think you are.” Dara shook her head from side to side, willing the colourful dots in her vision to stop wiggling. _Focus. _“I’ll make a la – make a light.” Her tongue didn’t seem to be working quite right.

It took her a long time to find the lantern she had bought, and even longer to successfully light a taper and then the wick. Dim light filled the tent.

Dara set the lantern down in the center, and sat down next to Vanyel, but without touching him. Her mind felt stuck, gluey; she couldn’t remember any of the things that Melody had told her would be helpful to say. “You seem upset,” she said finally. Stating the completely obvious. “Vanyel, can you please talk to me?”

“I said I’m _fine_.” He pulled away from her. “I’m going to sleep.”

“You really don’t seem fine.” Dara licked her lips. She wondered if it was obvious to him that she was drunk, or whether he was too distracted to notice. “Vanyel, can’t you just tell me what’s bothering you?”

“Can’t you just leave me alone?”

“No.” She folded her arms, trying not to sway; the walls of the tent still seemed to be moving. “Yfandes is worried. Vanyel, damn it, you can trust me!” Her chest felt hot, frustration and hurt – she had left a party, a _fun _party, and now he didn’t even want her here.

_:Steady, Chosen: _Rolan sent. _:This is not about you: _

That stung, but Rolan was right. Dara took a deep breath. “Vanyel, I need to know. If you’re having a problem.” Even if she didn’t particularly _want _to know, right this second – now that she was sitting down, her eyelids were feeling heavy, and it would have been very nice to go to sleep.

“I don’t know.” His voice was tight.

“Were the stories Karna told you upsetting?”

“…No, it’s not that.” He uncoiled a little, lifting his head, hair in his face. “I, just – I don’t know, Dara. I’m tired and I can’t…” He trailed off.

“Can’t what?”

He didn’t answer. _Why are you making this so hard? _Dara tried to remind herself that he probably wasn’t doing it on purpose.

“Vanyel,” she said, carefully. “Are you…thinking about wanting to be dead?” There, it was incredibly awkward to say out loud, but Melody had said it was important to ask if she suspected.

“I mean. If you must know. Yes.” His voice was jerky.

Like ice water dumped over her head, clearing some of the fog. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

Silence.

“I’m just _thinking _about it,” Vanyel muttered finally. He still wasn’t looking at her. “Not going to do anything. Can’t help what I think.”

“Still!” Dara folded her arms. “How long have you been feeling like that?”

“I don’t know.”

“Vanyel, you aren’t even trying!” Dara was angry now; she couldn’t help it. “Please. Talk to me. I want to help.” Damn it, she was doing a terrible job of this conversation. _Why does it have to be in the middle of the night when I’m tipsy? _

“You can’t.” His voice was harsh. “It’ll pass. Just let me sleep.”

“You weren’t sleeping before,” Dara pointed out. She felt unsteady, like the ground was sliding under her, and she couldn’t tell if it was the ale or the fear. “Vanyel, Melody told me about when I should be really worried and try to find more help, and I’m really worried right now!” Her voice rose to a shrill note.

“You’re overreacting.” He turned away from her. “It’s not that much worse than usual.”

Which was…less than reassuring. “Sorry! But you’re scaring me!” Dara hugged her knees to her chest. “Fine. Maybe I’m overreacting. I’d rather overreact than not do anything!”

“…Dara, there isn’t anything you _can _do.” His voice was softer, and a moment later he sat up straighter and pushed his hair out of his eyes; for the first time, he looked into her eyes. “I’m sorry. I…know it’s hard, for other people to…be around me, when I’m hurting, and…not be able to help. But you can’t fix it.” A quiet breath. “And it’s really not helping, having to reassure you on top of everything.”

Dara flinched back. “I’m sorry. I know.” That was one of the things Melody had said to her, she remembered now – Melody had told her to react calmly, not to get upset and panic, and she was _completely failing _at following that instruction. She took a deep breath. _Center and ground. _

“…You miss him, don’t you?” she said, half in a whisper.

“Like my arm. Like my heart.” Vanyel’s voice was choked. “Tylendel. He had a name.”

“Tylendel.” The name seemed to hang in the air between them. Dara reached out, tentatively, and put her hand on Vanyel’s shoulder.

“It feels stupid, you know?” He turned to look past her. “I’m sitting here missing someone who died almost seventeen years ago. It shouldn’t still hurt this much.”

“Vanyel, you don’t have to feel bad that it hurts.” That was one of the things Melody had said would help. “And, um, remember it’s worse than usual, right now, and it won’t be as bad in the morning.”

“That’s probably true.” He shook his head. “Never feels like it at the time.”

“I’m sorry, but I’m going to be a mother-hen now. You haven’t been getting enough sleep in general, have you?”

“…Probably not.”

“_Definitely _not. Vanyel, can we please make this a priority?” She swallowed. “I know you’re trying to just get through this so it’ll be over and we can go home. But I think it’s worth taking a few days until you feel better. And it’s not true that there’s nothing I can do to help.” She took a deep, steadying breath. “In the morning I’m going to find a Mindhealer for you.”

“What?” He stiffened. “Dara, that isn’t necessary.”

“Are you really going to give me that?” Melody had warned her that he would argue. “I know it probably seems like too much effort right now, but I promise, I’ll do all the work.” A daunting prospect, but maybe in the morning when she was sober, it would feel easier.

“You can’t do _all _the work,” Vanyel said flatly. “I still have to actually talk to them. You may not realize how exhausting it is.”

“Sorry. I’m going to make you do it anyway.” _Make it the path of least resistance for him to go along with it, _Melody had said. “Don’t worry about it now. Can you stop shielding Yfandes out, though?”

“…I didn’t realize I was.” He blinked, and something in him seemed to unwind a little.

_:Rolan?: _Dara sent.

He picked up on the wordless question. _:Yes. Yfandes says he’s letting her in, now: _A pause, and she could feel his mind moving, fast and complex and just out of her reach. _:You handled that well, Chosen. Yfandes says that this is far from the worst he has been, and she does not think he is a danger to himself, but that you were right to worry: _

“Thank you,” Dara said out loud. “Can you try to go to sleep now?”

“I can try. I got some sleeping-herbs from the bazaar, but they don’t seem to work very well.”

Dara wrinkled her nose. “Who did you get them from? Was it, what’s-his-name, Errek?”

“I think so, yes. With the yellow awning?”

“I don’t think he’s very reputable. Why didn’t you go to a real Healer?”

Vanyel shrugged. “It was easier. And cheaper.”

_Serves you right, _she thought but didn’t say. Vanyel was so competent in so many ways, but he could be incredibly naive about some things. “We’ll find you something better tomorrow. Probably too late tonight, I don’t know that anywhere would still be open. Um, is there anything else I can do to help?”

“I don’t know.” He glanced at her, then away. “I am glad you’re here.”

Dara had thought of something. “Vanyel? Remember when we were all in the Work Room?” It still hung in her mind like a jewel, rosy-pink.

“…Yes. What about it?”

She probably wouldn’t have suggested it if she were totally sober, but she forged ahead. “I remember how you were sitting with Savil and she was playing with your hair, and you looked so relaxed. Do you think…” She scooted over to the head of his bedroll. “I know Savil’s probably thinking about you right now, and missing you. Put your head here, and I can stroke your hair and you can imagine it’s Savil there. Would that help?”

Vanyel sat frozen for a moment, and Dara felt her cheeks flaming. _I shouldn’t have said that, it’s too weird, I made him uncomfortable… _

“Sure. Could try that.” Vanyel eased himself down onto the rumpled bedroll, pulling the blanket over himself. She felt the warm weight of his head settle onto her knee.

Dara hesitated, and then ran her hand over his tangled hair. The rough sword-calluses on her palm caught a little on the snarls; on the second pass, she used her fingertips. “Shush. It’s all right. Everything’s going to be fine. Just rest, now.” With her free hand, she felt around until she found the lantern, picked it up, and blew out the tiny flame. Darkness settled over them.

It was a strangely intimate moment. Dara closed her eyes, unsure how to feel about it.

Minutes passed. Vanyel shifted, trying to find a comfortable position, and then was still again. Dara’s arm was getting tired, but she didn’t want to stop. She switched hands, a little awkwardly.

She heard the change in Vanyel’s breathing, when he finally relaxed into sleep; a quick check with Thoughtsensing confirmed it. Very carefully, she lifted his head between her hands, extracted her knee, and replaced it with his pillow. All without waking him.

She nearly ruined it a moment later by knocking the lantern over, but she caught it in time, and made her way by feel to her own bedroll. Feeling rather proud of herself.

_:Goodnight, Rolan: _she sent.


	13. Chapter Thirteen

_– Galloping across the plains, dry golden grass, the wind in her hair – _

_– A melted, silvery stub, coming closer, growing larger and larger – _

_– A tent-flap, dancing in the wind – _

_– Sinking below the earth, through the stone, down and down and down – _

_– Stairs, raw-cut from stone, vanishing into darkness – _

_– A lantern flame, faint, flickering – _

_– A door – _

Dara woke with a start, half sitting up. For a moment, staring at the canvas inches from her nose, she had no idea where she was.

Glance around, and – oh. Right. Vanyel was sprawled on his stomach, silver-and-black hair drifted over his face. The light was pale and grey; it must have been dawn, or just before.

The slight headache behind her eyes, and the dizziness when she moved, filled in some more of the details. She was hungover, because she had been out at Jor’ethan last night, celebrating her success.

Dara squeezed her eyes shut, and the stone door at the bottom of the rough stairs hung in her mind’s eye.

Just a dream – and yet, there was no ‘just’ about it. _That was Foresight. _

She still felt disoriented, half-tangled in the remnants of the vision. There was something she had forgotten, that she was supposed to be doing…

Well, for one, she was supposed to be finding a Mindhealer. In Kata’shin’a’in. She didn’t have the faintest idea where to start.

Probably she ought to tell Rolan about her dream first, before she forgot any of it. It had been even clearer and more detailed, this time. _:Rolan?:_

_:Yes, Chosen?: _Based on the brief pause before his answer, she thought maybe she had woken him from sleep, but as usual, he was immediately alert, the light of his mind surrounding her like an ancient star.

_:Foresight dream: _She opened her shields, holding up the images one by one.

_:I see. Thank you: _

Dara wasn’t sure how she guessed, how her mind made the connection in a sudden flash of insight.

_:Urtho’s tower: _she sent. Rolan didn’t answer, but his wordless reaction told her enough. _:You knew: _she sent, half-accusing. _:You had already guessed: _

_:Yes: _A quiet, apologetic admission.

_:What do you think it means? Why do I keep Seeing it?: _The first time had been, gods, in the winter. Five months ago, the morning of the day they had found out about Leareth. It had to be relevant.

Silence.

She could talk it over with Vanyel, later. He might know more about interpreting Foresight, given that it was one of his Gifts.

_:I’m going to go wash up: _she sent. Maybe she could get to the public water-trough before it was all dirty from everyone else using it. _:Um, is Yfandes nearby?: _She wasn’t sure if she ought to leave Vanyel alone.

_:Yes. Don’t worry about it, Chosen: _

She extricated herself from the bedroll as silently as possibly, and found a pair of mostly-clean Whites; by this point in summer, just about everything was dusty. Vanyel hated it. Dara didn’t mind much. Barefoot, with just her hose on and her shirt and tunic hanging over one arm, her new sandals in the other hand, she padded out of the tent and towards the nearest crossing.

Dunking her head right into the still-icy water, she came up gasping, thoroughly revived, shaking her head like a dog and sending droplets everywhere. It was a beautiful dawn, like something out of a painting; the sky seemed to go on forever, pink-gold clouds like skeins of yarn above the horizon.

_I should get started. _She didn’t move for a moment, though, just stared vaguely at the colourful silhouettes of tents.

She didn’t even know a word in Shin’a’in’ for ‘Mindhealer’. There must have been Healers around somewhere, but she didn’t blame Vanyel for having gone to the bazaar instead; she didn’t have the slightest idea where to find them either. Maybe there were signs, but she still couldn’t read the Shin’a’in script well enough to decipher them.

At least she did know the word for ‘Healer’, so she could ask for directions there. Maybe if she found a Healers’ tent or the equivalent, they would know.

She wouldn’t know whether to trust their recommendations, though. What she really needed was a person she _could _trust, someone who could act as a guide.

Her friends at Jor’ethan didn’t feel right – they were fun, but she wouldn’t have said they were especially trustworthy. They were kids. Mercenaries seemed even less likely to be helpful, and Lady Eskarina the gem-trader wasn’t from the area at all.

Who else did she know?

A face drifted into her mind’s eye. Ke’valen, with his brilliant toothy smile and jet-black braids. She had found him quite attractive, and been disappointed to learn that he wasn’t interested in women. Or men. Apparently a condition of swearing his oath to the Goddess meant that he had no sexual interest in anyone. He didn’t seem to think it much of a loss, and had only laughed when she suggested it was an awfully big sacrifice to make.

Still, he was friendly to her – and if Kal’enedral were like Heralds, then surely he was a man of integrity, and she could trust him.

_:Rolan?: _she sent. _:What do you think?:_

_:I think it’s a good idea, love: _

Dara finished washing, scooping up handfuls of water, and then put on her shirt over still-damp skin. She turned onto the broad, straight path that led inward to the Old City, like the spoke on a carriage-wheel, and started to walk.

The sun was a hand’s-breadth above the horizon by the time she reached it, already bright, bleaching the bright colours. Dara walked around the perimeter until she saw one of the Kal’enedral, brown-robed, of indeterminate gender until she walked closer.

“Good morning,” Dara said in Shin’a’in. A woman, she decided, though the Swordsworn’s prominent, hawk-like nose was rather masculine. “Um, I was wondering, is Ke’valen shena Pretera’sedrin around?”

The woman’s blue eyes rested flatly on her, unsmiling. “It is his rest day.”

“Can you tell him I’m here?” Dara pressed. “I’m Herald Dara of Valdemar. We’re friends.” Well, she thought so – hopefully Ke’valen agreed and wouldn’t resent the imposition.

“If you wish.” The woman turned without another word and walked away.

_She wasn’t very friendly_. Dara tried not to feel hurt. She paced back and forth, waiting, already wishing she had brought her scarf; the sun was blazing right into her eyes now.

“Dara of Valdemar?” She spun around. Ke’valen was smiling, holding out his hands in greeting; he didn’t seem annoyed. “You are returned?”

“I got back yesterday.” She grinned back. “It went very well. I made a hundred and twenty gold.”

His eyes widened in mock-surprise. “Oh! You have a trader’s heart. I think you belong here after all.”

“Thank you.” She looked down at her shoes, blushing. “Ke’valen… I actually need help with something. Can we go somewhere private and talk?” 

The briefest of hesitations, and then Ke’valen bobbed his head. “Come with me.”

She followed him a little ways into the inner city, and he gestured to a stone bench in the shade between two buildings. They sat.

“What is it you wish to speak of?” he said.

She swallowed. “First of all, can you keep it a secret?” Vanyel wouldn’t want this spread around, even to strangers. Especially to strangers.

“Of course.” He looked almost affronted by her having to ask.

“Thank you. It’s for my friend Vanyel, not me.” She took a deep breath, grateful for the practice she had gotten in the Shin’a’in language; she wasn’t totally fluent, but she knew more words now. “He’s having a hard time right now and I think he needs a Healer. But not a normal Healer. Someone who can treat…bad feelings.”

Ke’valen’s eyes creased at the corners. “What ails him?”

“His mind is sick.” Vanyel would hate her putting it that way, but she didn’t have better words. “He’s very sad and he isn’t sleeping well. It’s, er, not a new problem, but it’s worse than before and I think he needs help.”

“Oh.” Ke’valen was silent for a moment. “I am sorry to hear your friend is suffering.”

“You have someone who can help, right?” Dara said. “A Healer for minds?”

“I am not sure what you mean.” Ke’valen was frowning. “Perhaps you want a Healer who is also an Empath?”

“…No, I didn’t mean that. I mean someone who has a special Gift. For minds.”

“Do you mean a Tale’edras Healing-Adept?” Ke’valen shook his head. “I am afraid we do not have such Gifts here.”

“No! I don’t mean that either, that’s totally different!” Dara was frustrated now. “I’m looking for someone who can, um, See what’s wrong in his head. With their Gift. And then fix it. It’s not the same thing as Thoughtsensing.” Why hadn’t she paid more attention when they were learning about Gifts? She had only the faintest idea of how Mindhealing actually worked, and wasn’t sure how to describe it further.

Ke’valen lifted his eyes, apologetic. “You know of such a Gift? I do not.”

“Oh.” Damn. Dara hadn’t even considered that. Though maybe she should have – her thoughts were racing ahead now. There were less than twenty thousand Shin’a’in, Ke’valen had said when she asked. Mindhealing was a very rare Gift. Valdemar had a population of half a million, and five Mindhealers. One per hundred thousand. Maybe it wasn’t all that surprising that the Shin’a’in would have no one at all, and wouldn’t even know what the Gift was.

Back up and start over. “Ke’valen, if someone was very upset and sad about something, where would you send them?”

“The clan shaman, perhaps? It is their role to offer advice to those who are troubled or have difficult choices to make.”

“No, that isn’t really it…” Dara yanked at a fistful of hair. “I mean, maybe, but it’s not like there’s a specific situation right now that’s upsetting – well, there is, sort of, but I don’t think it’s the main thing – I don’t know!” Her eyes were burning now, and she almost reached out to Rolan, just for reassurance, but she stopped herself. _Pull yourself together, Herald. You can do this. _

Ke’valen’s concerned face swam in a haze. “You fear for him.”

“Yes!” She squeezed her eyes shut against the threatening tears. “Ke’valen, I’m _terrified. _We’re eight hundred miles from home and he’s telling me he was thinking about wanting to die, I mean, his Companion said he wouldn’t _do _anything, but it’s still really scary! I don’t know what to do!” She pulled her knees in to her chest, hugging herself. “It’s my fault. I shouldn’t’ve left.”

A moment’s silence, and then she felt Ke’valen’s hand on her shoulder. “I am sorry. Dara, I can tell you, it is not your fault.”

“What do I do?” Maybe she ought to go back into Jkatha. They had a larger population, they were more likely to have Mindhealers, but Throne City was a five-day ride away and Vanyel wasn’t going to want to leave in the middle of their work here… “I have lots of gold,” she said quickly. “If that’s an issue. Um, if you do know any Healers who are Empaths, maybe that’s better than nothing.” 

“I am thinking.” A brief silence. “Come with me.”

Dara let him pull her to her feet. “Where are we going?”

“To see the Healer of my clan. I think she will know what to do.”

* * *

Some things were constant, Savil thought. Stones rolled downhill. Trees grew upward. Harvest-taxes were increased. And supper with the Ashkevron family was always uncomfortable and weird.

The dishes had been cleared away, and they had retired to Treesa’s living-room, which always made Savil feel like she was inside a flower. Withen and Lissa were arguing about Guard placements in the study. Medren had invited Stefen along again, as a buffer between him and Lady Treesa, and the two of them were playing a duet from the Windrider Cycle.

Savil figured she had to stay another half-candlemark before she could gracefully escape. She had a lot of work to do, but she might be too drunk to look at the treasury-budget – several cups of wine was the only way she could get through a whole three-course meal without screaming at any of them. Lady Treesa had worried out loud about Vanyel and his ‘trade-mission’ until Savil wanted to throw her out a window.

_I miss you, ke’chara. _Every once in a while, even now, she would try to Mindspeak him without thinking, mental fingers straining into the distance and finding nothing.

And a conversation from earlier today was still weighing on her mind. Katha had come to her. She was a very perceptive woman – any spymaster had to be. _Something happened, didn’t it? Savil, all of a sudden I feel like an outsider looking in. _

It was true; there was a new division, an inner core that had formed within the ranks of the Senior Circle. The people who had been there in the Work Room, setting aside all their shields and barriers, and the people who hadn’t. Unsurprising, that Katha had noticed; it was maybe more surprising that the others hadn’t. Or maybe they had, and Katha was the only one who had the words to name it.

They had tried to tear down a wall, and only built new ones.

Savil rubbed her eyes. _Stop woolgathering, old woman. _It was a pointless loop that she had been over a thousand times; no new information to digest.

“Herald-Mage Savil?”

She twisted her neck around. “Oh. Hello, Stefen.”

He was perched on the arm of her chair, elbow propped on one knee, other leg swinging. “Tea?” He held out a cup.

_Now, what does he remind me of? _She couldn’t quite catch onto it. “You’re a dear.” Bardic students were always so perceptive.

“Copper for your thoughts?” Eyebrows raised, a face that said he really and truly wanted to know.

Savil chuckled. “I wish you’d get down from there and sit normally, for one. Any minute you’re going to fall off and smash your head open.”

“I wouldn’t do that. It would ruin your night.”

That wrenched a snort of real laughter from her. “Good lad.”

He slipped down, lightly like a cat, and pulled over one of the footrests to sit on it, legs tucked in. “So? What’s got you so distracted?”

“It’s that obvious?” She sighed. “Politics. And weather-magic. Neither of which makes for good conversation.”

“You’re selling yourself short.” Stef dimpled at her. “Weather-magic sounds pretty interesting. Though from what I’ve heard, it’s risky. You need to be careful of what you change, right? Because it can ripple down and affect wind-patterns and rain-patterns all over, months later, and then you’re stuck cleaning up more and more.”

She blinked, startled – it was the first time she had heard someone who wasn’t a mage acknowledge that. “I wish Joshel understood those considerations as well as you do, lad.”

“Just seems obvious. Everything’s got a price.”

She nodded, sipping the tea. “I’m sorry. Shouldn’t dump my complaints on you.”

“I don’t mind at all. Way I see it, anyone doing a job as hard as yours has a right to complain.”

Flattery worked even when you knew exactly what was happening, Savil thought ruefully. “You’re very sweet, Stefen.”

He winked. “Sounds like maybe you’d rather do something other than complain about your day. Did you hear about Trainee Darien at Bardic and his lady friend at Healers’?”

“No, I didn’t.” There was no particular reason she would know student gossip, and Stefen would know that – but he was offering a distraction, if she wanted it. She found that she did. “Do tell.”

* * *

Vanyel lay with the pillow over his head, trying to block out the sunlight filtering through the canvas. This time, at least, he had woken in time to reverse his weather-barrier _before _the inside of the tent became intolerably hot.

He couldn’t manage to fall asleep, but he was too tired to do anything else. _‘Lendel, ashke, I miss you. _An ache in his chest that wouldn’t go away.

He had dreamed of ‘Lendel last night – just the two of them, walking in the grove that had once been theirs, until suddenly ‘Lendel wasn’t there anymore, and Vanyel had turned and seen him on the other side of a Gate, back to him, hands raised. He had woken to Yfandes already in full rapport, her light filling his mind, and an empty tent; Dara was apparently up already. Which gave him time to plan his apology for last night, anyway.

Yfandes jumped in. _:Chosen, you don’t need to apologize. You didn’t do anything wrong: _

_:I was a mess and I took it out on her: _He had been very rude, and she had only been trying to help.

He ought to get up, do something useful, at least take notes on what he still remembered from the night before – which apparently wasn’t much. His mind skidded over it, lost in haze.

_:You were exhausted, love: _Yfandes sent. _:No wonder you couldn’t pay attention. I should have made you take the night off: _

The worst part was, she was probably right. He had found it very difficult to focus on Karna’s tale, most of the words had gone in one ear and right out the other, even though he knew how important it was. Stupid of him. _Why can’t I do this one thing right? _

_:Hey: _Yfandes interrupted the chain of thought with a playful mental smack. _:Stop it: _

_:Stop what?:_

_:Being negative about everything: _A pause. _:Dara’s coming back: _

_:Thanks for the warning: _A moment later, Vanyel heard the footsteps outside. He shook off the pillow and sat up, fruitlessly trying to smooth down his hair; it was a lost cause at this point, matted with dust and sweat. _Gods, I want a bath. _He was really starting to hate this place.

The tent-flap lifted. Bright blue eyes twinkled at him from the midst of one giant freckle. “Good morning! I brought you chava.”

Dara’s morning cheeriness was especially grating today, but she wasn’t doing it to annoy him on purpose, and it wasn’t her fault he was cranky. “Thank you. Dara, listen, I’m really sorry about–”

“Don’t be.” She cut him off before he could even finish, passed him the cup, and then squatted on her side of the tent. “How are you feeling?”

He sipped the hot, sweet chava. “A lot better, actually.” Mostly true. She didn’t need to know about his nightmares. “I told you, I just needed some sleep.”

Dara nodded briskly. “Well, how long do you need to get ready? We’re going to Pretera'sedrin Camp.”

“What? Why?” He set down the cup. “I’m tired, Dara. I wanted to rest–”

Dara plowed ahead, not even waiting for him to finish. “We’re going to see their Healer. They don’t seem to know what Mindhealers are, here – sorry, I really did try. But Ke’valen says she’s really good, and I talked to her for a bit, I like her.”

He groaned. “Dara, I’m fine now. I don’t need to see a Healer.”

“You do,” Dara insisted, chin jutting stubbornly.

_:You really should go, love: _Yfandes prodded. _:At the very least, get some sleeping-herbs that actually work. It’s not going to get any easier to sleep here, you can’t expect anything to change unless you do something different: _

_:Fine: _He hid a yawn behind his hand. “Dara, give me half a candlemark to wake up. I want to be a bit more presentable.”

More like a full candlemark later, they rode abreast on the path, towards the Pretera'sedrin camp, visible from quite a long way off. Clan of the Grass-Cat. Their centrepiece was a tall, flimsy tower, buffered in canvas and leather, with a tapestry showing a snarling cat hanging from the side.

Dara stopped in front and swung down easily from Rolan’s saddle. She waved to the knot of children playing with some kind of wooden interlocking blocks out in front.

Vanyel eased himself down from Yfandes’ back. _:Thank you, love: _It was easier to be grateful now; he felt a lot less irritable after his morning chava, though it had still taken a massive effort of will to haul himself out of the tent and face the inevitable crowds.

Yfandes snorted, tossing her head. _:You’re welcome. Listen to the nice Healer, please: _

He didn’t deign that with an answer, just followed Dara towards the decorative archway, festooned with wooden cat teeth, that marked the entrance to the camp. She must have been here before, because she was greeting _everyone_, usually by name.

“This way.” Dara grabbed his hand and dragged him towards a cluster of domed, hexagonal tents in different sizes, like a beehive, in blue and silver. Vanyel had been expecting green, for a Healer, but of course that was a Valdemaran custom.

Dara stopped in front of a square flap. “Healer An'dora?” she said, using the Shin’a’in title.

The cloth lifted aside, revealing a very short, plump woman also dressed in blue and silver. “Come in, child.” Her deep-set blue eyes darted to Vanyel. “This is the friend you spoke of?”

Vanyel felt his cheeks heating. _Damn it, what did she say about me? _

“Yes. This is Herald-Mage Vanyel of Valdemar. Wingbrother to k’Treva.”

The Healer bowed. “An honour to meet you. Come in.”

Off balance, Vanyel ducked through the doorway into surprisingly cool dimness, smiling awkwardly. “Thank you, Healer An'dora.”

There were wooden shelves stacked around the walls, and tables, all bearing jars and bottles and tiny boxes. It smelled like herbs and incense.

“Come, this way.” Apparently the beehive was connected on the inside, and he followed her through one of the hexagons, pushing through a curtain of beaded strings. Dara was still gripping his hand, and he let her.

They went through another dome, dodging stacks of crates, and then into a smaller one, furnished only with what appeared to be the entire skin of a large plains-cat, head and all.

“Sit,” the Healer said, placing her hands on his shoulders and pushing him down. “Let me look at you.” She smiled, dimples winking. “Relax. I do not bite.”

He felt the brush of Dara’s Mindtouch against his shields. _:I can leave if you want: _she sent. _:If you’d rather have privacy: _

_:No, stay: _It was reassuring to have her there, even if he was annoyed with her for hauling him here in the first place.

The rug was very soft, and there was padding under it; Vanyel felt himself almost sinking into it. The Healer’s fingertips rested on his forehead for a long time, and he felt the brush of her Gift, exploring gently – but odd, different, the cool questioning touch seemed to be inside his head.

“Ah,” she said, cryptically. “Now, tell me in your words, what troubles you?”

Next to him, Dara squeezed his hand tightly.

“What did Dara say?” he said.

“That you are in pain, and you find it hard to bear.” She cocked her head to one side. “But I would like to hear you speak of it.”

_Gods, here we go again. _The last thing Vanyel wanted to do was explain the story of his life to yet another stranger.

_:Please be cooperative: _Yfandes sent, along with a wash of affection.

Vanyel fixed his eyes on the bridge of her nose. “I should give you some context. Do you know what a _shay’kreth’ashke _is?” It was the Tayledras word, but the languages were similar enough, and he had never learned a specific Shin’a’in term.

“Yes.” A nod. “One’s soul-partner. Two spirits that are meant to be together. We know of this thing, though it is very rare.”

“Yes, well, my _shay’kreth’ashke _died.”

“Aiii!” Her eyes widened. “By the highest gods! I am sorry. I cannot imagine…”

“It was a long time ago,” Vanyel said tonelessly. “It’s…still hard. All the time, really, but I guess it’s worse right now. I don’t like traveling, I hate it here–” he realized what he had said, and quickly tried to backtrack. “Sorry, I mean, I don’t, everyone here is lovely, it’s just–”

“I am not offended.” An’dora’s eyes twinkled, though her mouth was serious. “Kata’shin’a’in can be an overwhelming place for those who prefer solitude, and I confess I am often one of them.”

“That’s a big part of it. And, all right, I’ve been an idiot about getting enough sleep. I keep thinking I can get away with staying up late, for my, um, commitments, and push through.” He realized he didn’t know if Karna and the shaman would want it spread around that he was viewing the memory tapestries. “So I’m tired, and…I guess I get pretty negative.” He managed a weak smile. “I should know better by now, that always happens. It’s bearable, though. It’s been worse than this before, and I’m used to living with it. All I really need is something to help me sleep.”

The Healer was nodding slowly. “That is easy enough to address. We will speak of it soon. First.” Her eyes seemed to bore into him. “I would hear more of the feelings that trouble you.”

She clearly wasn’t going to let him get away with saying nothing, so he might as well pick something relatively inoffensive. Her gentle, almost motherly face made it surprisingly easy. “I’m homesick, I guess.” Yfandes should have been enough, he was almost ashamed that she wasn’t – but he missed Savil, and Shavri, and Jisa. Damn it, his eyes were burning again. “I know it’ll end, but it doesn’t always feel like it…”

An’dora questioned him gently for several minutes, drawing out far more than he had expected to say. Yes, everything felt hopeless, even though he knew that wasn’t reality. Yes, he felt inadequate, and guilty that he wasn’t managing better. Yes, he was irritable and impatient and found himself snapping at people. Sometimes he found his emotions overpowering, intolerable.

Yes, it was easy to slip into wishing he wasn’t alive anymore.

It hurt less to talk about than he had expected; An’dora’s quiet sympathy helped a surprising amount. Even when he lost his grip on the tears for a minute or two, she said nothing, only waited and then offered him a cloth to blow his nose.

He sort of wished Dara hadn’t been there to see that part, but her presence was comforting as well. She had seen him completely lose his composure before, he reminded himself, in the Work Room.

Finally, An’dora sat back. “You know your own mind well, I think. You will find your way through this, in time – but perhaps I might help. There is herb I can give you; as willowbark dulls the pain of your body, it dulls pain in the mind.”

“Really? I’ve never heard of that.”

“Perhaps it does not grow so far north as Valdemar.” Her cheeks bunched in a smile. “It does not work for everyone, and it will take perhaps a week or two to be sure, for you.”

_:I think you should try it: _Yfandes sent. _:Seems worth trying anything, at this point, and I trust her:_

Vanyel nodded. “All right.”

“Good!” Her smile broadened. “I would like you to stay here. Three days, I think.”

“What?” He stared at her. “No! I have things to do!”

“Are they so urgent? You say yourself, you are weary. You ought rest until you are well.”

“I’m not sick,” he protested.

An’dora’s eyebrows rose. “It is a sickness of the mind and not the body, but that does not make it any less real.” She levelled a very disapproving look at him. “Are you always so cruel to yourself?”

He looked away, almost ashamed. _I feel like a naughty little boy._ “I’m just being realistic. I can’t afford to waste time.” 

“Three days.” There was iron in your voice. “And it will not be wasted.”

_:Chosen: _Yfandes’ mindvoice was very patient. _:I told you, listen to the nice Healer: _

_:Shut up, horse: _But he lifted his head. “All right. I’ll stay.” It was more comfortable than his tent, there was that much. “Um, is there somewhere nearby for my Companion?” 

_:Don’t worry about me, Chosen: _A mental chuckle, and she shared her senses with him for a moment; he caught a glimpse of three little girls of varying heights, blue eyes and jet-black braids, all fighting to offer her pieces of dried fruit. _:Why don’t you send Dara back to get your things?:_

* * *

Dara paced, her hand on Rolan’s neck. The sun was low in the sky, and the air was cooling, enough that it was tolerable to be out and moving.

_:Rolan: _she sent. _:I want to know what you think: _

_:Of what, Chosen?: _He felt distracted, his thoughts elsewhere.

_:Of everything. And my Foresight dream in particular. What it wants us to do: _She was annoyed with Rolan. He hadn’t seemed to be paying her full attention all day.

_:I am still considering it: _

That wasn’t an answer. _:Fine: _Dara sent. _:I’ll start: _She felt itchy, impatient. _:One. We’re learning a lot, but we don’t know how far to trust it: _

_:Go on: _Rolan sent – encouraging, but still distant.

_:Ravenwing barely knew anything about Ma’ar: _Dara added, _:and it’s all second or third-hand. We’ve heard about the ‘atrocities’ he committed, but honestly, it was wartime, and I know from our histories that we’ve done some pretty bad things in war ourselves: _It was hard for her to be too appalled by Ma’ar’s use of double agents to turn the course of an important battle, not when the Heralds had been trying for the entire war to get a spy into the Karsite ranks and do that exact thing.

_:I would not compare it, Chosen: _There was an edge of disapproval in Rolan’s mindvoice. _:We do not use dark artifacts: _

_:Yes, but that actually saved lives, compared to the alternative. He was trying to be merciful: _And it had worked; the Royal City had been taken with remarkably little death.

Urtho had been the one considering whether to destroy it.

_:Besides: _she went on, _:this is Ravenwing’s telling of it – even the stories that come from other people, she’s the one who actually recorded almost all of them. And she hated Ma’ar. Understandably, I mean, he was on the other side of a war that destroyed her home, but it does give her a bias: _Dara could think of a few people she knew who hated the Karsites just as violently, even now.

_:A valid point: _

Dara sighed. _:I’m grateful that we have the other side of the story. Something that isn’t from Leareth, that we know he didn’t influence. And I can admit it doesn’t look good, so far – it certainly looks like he was in the wrong, in this war: _They didn’t know how the war had started, not really, because Ravenwing hadn’t know._ :But…it still feels like maybe we need a _third _side to the story:_

_:More information is always helpful: _Rolan acknowledged. _:Yet we are lucky to have even this much: _

_:That’s why I’m wondering about the vision I keep seeing:_ She kicked a clod of dirt, watching it shatter into dust. _:What if my Foresight is telling me that we can get another side to the story, by going there? It seems to be telling me that there’s something to find: _What if the stairs and the door were literal? Maybe there really was something left. Or maybe they were symbols for some other kind of information they could learn. Dara had read the only extant treatise on Foresight, recommended to her by Vanyel years ago, and long-range Foresight was often metaphorical in strange and cryptic ways.

Silence – but in the silence, there was pride, almost smugness.

_:Damn it, Rolan!: _Dara folded her arms, rounding on him. _:You guessed it ages ago, didn’t you? And you were waiting for me to come up with it on my own: _

He bent his white head. _:Perhaps. I am pleased. It did not take you so long: _

He could try his flattery; Dara was still angry enough to spit nails. _:Why didn’t you tell me?: _

A heavy mental sigh. _:I would have, had it been delaying us. It was not. We cannot move on from Kata’shin’a’in until Vanyel has viewed all that he can here: _

A fair point – and for that to happen, they had to get him in better shape first. Gods, she hoped Healer An’dora knew what she was doing. _:Fine. But I don’t like it that you keep things from me, Rolan: _

_:I must: _For a moment, it was as though a wall moved aside, in his mind, and the cold, alien blue light that was him shone directly on her. _:You are mortal, and I am not. There will always be things I cannot tell you: _

Dara stomped her foot. She knew it was childish, and in that moment, she couldn’t bring herself to care. _:Well, that doesn’t mean I have to like it! I’m upset with you!: _

She turned her back, and stormed away. Which was petty, and immature, and she knew that, but she was too angry and confused to drill down on her real objection.

He would forgive her. He always did.

* * *

“Heya, Stef.” Medren lifted his head an inch from the bedspread, then let it fall. “You’re late.”

“Am I?” Stef said, disinterested, bolting the door behind him and bending to remove his soft boots.

“It’s past curfew,”Medren pointed out. “And I _know _you weren’t with Katha tonight, so what gives…?” The cat-in-cream grin that Stef tried to hide, and the languid, relaxed way he moved, gave it away. “You were at the damned shaych tavern again, weren’t you?”

Stef flung himself down on his bed with a sigh. “What’s it to you?”

“Nothing, I guess.” Medren let out his breath in a gust. “Do whatever you want. It’s your life. Just figure I should remind you, if you abuse your right to be out after curfew, Breda might revoke it.”

“She won’t,” Stef said cheerfully. “Actually, I _was _on a project for Katha.”

“At the shaych tavern.” Medren hoped his voice sounded as dubious as he felt.

“Yes, in fact. She heard a certain meeting was happening there. Wanted me to eavesdrop. So I did.” A lazy smile. “And then I might’ve stayed a while. You know, just to see if I might overhear anything else.”

“Stef, you’re incorrigible.” Medren propped his head up on his fists, watching Stef out of the corner of his eye. He smirked. “I guess this means you’re not hung up on my Uncle Van anymore.”

–Even in the candlelight, the pink flush across Stef’s cheeks was visible. _He’s still head over heels. _Stef thought it was a lot less obvious than it was.

“Herald Vanyel,” Stef said, stiffly, “isn’t here. And there are some very attractive men who are here. Who aren’t ‘too ethical’ for me.”

“Stef, you know, sometimes I wonder if you’re deliberately only sleeping with horrible people.”

“Who said horrible people? It’s not like I’m bedding anyone who would torture kittens. Just people who aren’t so upright and prudish that they’ll turn down someone who’s clearly interested. Medren, _no one _is getting hurt. Except your sense of propriety.”

And his friend’s feelings, Medren thought. “Sorry, Stef. I’m being judgemental again.”

“You certainly are.” Stef turned his back.

It was a good sign for his roommate’s wellbeing, Medren thought, that he had the energy to go out and seduce people. Stef had come home looking deflated and worried, one night a few weeks ago, and eventually confessed that Shavri had finally gotten the hang of copying his Gift – with both her and Randi in trance, and she could still only do it with Jisa’s help.

Medren hadn’t seen the problem at all. _Obviously _they still needed Stef, and even if they hadn’t, his roommate had plenty of other prospects.

Maybe the upside was clearer to him now; he had more evenings free, they only called him in for Randi’s formal audiences and Council meetings. Katha had cut back their lessons as well, and moved them later in the day. Apparently she was pregnant, and mornings weren’t treating her well.

Medren sighed. It seemed Stef was going to sulk all night, unless he distracted him.

“I saw you sucking up to my aunt the other night,” he said brightly. “Think she likes you.”

“Wasn’t sucking up.” Stef levelled a glare over his shoulder. “She looked like she needed a distraction.”

“I’m sure. Just wondered what you want from her.”

“Nothing. Why do you always think that’s the only reason I’m ever nice to people?” Stef flopped down on the bed.

_Because you try your damned hardest to give that impression. _“Just wondered. You like her?”

“I do. She’s like Breda. You know, gruff with a heart of gold.”

“I suppose she is.” Maybe that was why Stef was so relaxed around her. Most reasonable people found Savil intimidating, but Medren knew his roommate well, and could tell when he was faking enjoying himself, versus really having fun. “You made her laugh. That was impressive.”

Stef said nothing, but he was smiling to himself, and the tension was broken. _There_. A little flattery always worked, even when Stef knew that was exactly what he was doing.

“I think she’s having a hard time right now,” Stef said finally, thoughtful. “She said politics… I think she finds people hard to deal with. She can do it, she has a lot of practice, but she doesn’t _like _it.”

It was just like Stef, to make wild guesses about how other people’s minds worked. In this case, Medren thought, he was probably right.

* * *

“Vanyel?” Dara nudged at the curtain of beads. “Can I come in?”

“Mmm?”

She pushed her way through. “Yfandes said you wanted company. I brought you some more of the fruit pastry, and I found you some books you can read if you’re bored.” She handed him the pastry, on a woven-grass plate that could be thrown away afterwards. “What happened to your hair?” It was damp, clean, and had sprouted a number of braids with colourful beads on the ends.

Vanyel looked self-conscious. “A bath. And An’dora’s children. I think they’ve adopted me.”

“Oh. Are they bothersome?”

“No.” He shook his head. “An’dora said she could keep them out if I wanted, but I like littles. They’re very sweet. The eldest read me a storybook in Shin’a’in for a whole candlemark. I kept falling asleep but she didn’t mind.”

“You’re not finding it too bad here, then?”

“I guess not.I feel completely pampered. Seems a bit unnecessary, it’s not like I’m actually ill.” His eyes went unfocused for a moment. “Yfandes says I’ve earned it.”

“It’s nice in here.” The decor was very soothing, the air smelled lovely, and somehow they were keeping the temperature inside pleasant, without magic. It felt like an oasis of calm. “You seem more relaxed,” she added.

“It’s quite relaxing,” he said, thickly through a mouthful of pastry. “One of An’dora’s apprentices gave me the best massage I’ve ever had. Scented oils and everything. It was ridiculous, you’d think I was royalty or something.” He yawned again, and rubbed his eyes. “Sorry. Whatever she gave me is making me drowsy. I’m not good for much right now.”

“You don’t have to be. Vanyel, you’ve been working really, really hard, you _have _earned some rest. And some nice things.”

He frowned. “…Dara, how much is this going to cost? I’m assuming she isn’t seeing me for free.”

“Don’t worry about that. I’ve got it covered.” For once, Dara hadn’t even bothered to haggle. Ten gold _daari _seemed quite reasonable, for three days of a skilled Healer’s one-on-one attention. “Listen, though, if you’re up for it, there was something I wanted to talk about.”

“Oh?”

“I had the Foresight dream again last night.” Dara took a deep breath, steeling herself. “This time I recognized it. I think I’m Seeing what’s left of Urtho’s Tower.”

Vanyel froze, pastry an inch from his lips.

“That’s three times,” Dara said. “The Tower’s been in every dream. It was the first thing I Saw. And this last time, I saw something more – something underground. Vanyel, I talked to Rolan, and I talked to the senior shaman, what’s-his-name, Tre’haren, and I talked toyour Scrollsworn friend Karna.” It had taken her half the afternoon to talk her way in past the guards, and candlemarks more to actually finish that conversation. “Vanyel, I think we need to go there.”

“What?” He was staring at her. “You – what – they agreed to talk to you?”

“Rolan said I ought to go.” She forced her shoulders to relax. “I’m sorry if it feels like I went behind your back. Anyway, they said they need to consult the _leshy’a Kal’enedral _again – but I think they’ll let us.” She braced her hands in front of her. “It’s pretty much right in the center of the plains. Ka'venusho.Just over a hundred miles from here.”

Vanyel’s eyes stared into the distance. “I know that name… They confirmed it? It’s a real place?”

She nodded, solemnly. “I drew a picture for them. Let Rolan use my hands, rather, I’m terrible at drawing.”

“We’re not going to find anything there,” Vanyel said, harshly. “There’s nothing left.”

“I don’t think that’s true.” She closed her eyes, and the stairs were there, shimmering against her eyelids. The door. “Vanyel, I didn’t say this to the shaman, but – I think maybe there’s something still there, underground.”

“Urtho’s weapons.”

“More than that, maybe.” She held up her hands, helplessly. “I don’t know. It’s just, I keep dreaming about it, there’s got to be a reason.”

“I believe you, Dara.” For a moment, Vanyel’s eyes were like wide-open windows; there was a nakedness there that she hadn’t seen since the Work Room. “Guess I just want this journey to be over.”

“That’s why it’s so important that you rest, now,” Dara said quickly. “You’ll see. I bet in a few days you’ll feel loads better and it won’t seem so daunting.”

Vanyel rolled his eyes. “You’re not my mother, Dara.”

“Sorry.” She wasn’t especially sorry.

He sighed. “Dara, I’m going to be surprised if they let us onto the Plains proper.”

“We’ll see.” She had feeling that they _would _be going, but it was just a feeling after all, and she let it slide. “Anyway. Did you want me to stay here tonight? An’dora said I could bed down in the corner, if you want company.”

“Mmm. Thank you for offering, but I think I need my own space for a bit.”

She tried not to feel hurt – it wasn’t personal, that he didn’t want her around, and it would be nice to have the tent to herself for once.


	14. Chapter Fourteen

Vanyel woke slowly, floating up through layers of hazy dreams. He was so comfortable; it felt like he was lying on a cloud. It was dark, and quiet, and the air smelled like incense.

His eyes drifted open. The light was dim and blue, oddly patterned.

_:’Fandes?: _he sent. _:Where am I?: _It should probably have bothered him more, that he couldn’t remember.

_:Clan Pretera'sedrin, remember? With the Healer: _

Oh. Right.

For the first time in weeks, he _wasn’t _waking to a pounding headache. That was nice. He vaguely remembered Dara reading out loud to him, while he struggled to stay awake. And then An’dora, sitting next to him, coaxing him to drink more herb-tea.

_:Chosen, how are you feeling?: _Yfandes sent.

_:Foggy: _He felt like he must have been asleep for about ten years, and his bladder was ready to burst. _:What time is it?: _

_:A candlemark past noon: _

_:Oh!: _How could he possibly have slept so long?

_:They’ve got drapes to keep out the light, that helps. We should get some for the tent: _

For some reason that had never occurred to him. _:I really need to use the privy: _He didn’t want to move, but there was no point putting off the inevitable. He sat up.

And reeled, the room spinning. _:’Fandes, help!:_

_:What’s wrong?: _

_:I don’t know: _He cupped his hands over his face, fighting the sudden dizziness.

“Vanyel? Are you awake?” The voice drifted in.

“An’dora,” he croaked.

“Wait a moment. I will be right there.” Rustling, and then the light brightened, as she reached through the fringe of beaded strings that was his ‘door’ and pulled down a heavy felt drape from the ceiling of the tent.

“An’dora, I don’t feel well.”

“What ails you?” She knelt beside him, her cool fingers brushing his forehead. “Headache? Your stomach?”

“Dizzy.” Though it was subsiding, now. “Why…?”

“A side effect of the herbs you are taking,” she said simply. “I did warn you. It will be worst on the first day, and should pass as your body adjusts. Better?”

“A little.” She had warned him, but apparently he hadn’t really been listening. “Um, I have to use the latrines, I…think I need help.”

About a candlemark later, he was sitting on a bench in the shade under an awning; it was hot, even out of the direct sun, but there was a breeze. Yfandes was curled at his feet like some gigantic dog, and he seemed to have acquired a toddler in his lap. _Whose _toddler, he wasn’t sure – not one of An’dora’s, or at least he didn’t recognize the boy from yesterday. There were littles all over, running about with no particular supervision. They seemed to find Yfandes fascinating; two little girls were busy braiding her mane.

Vanyel wasn’t in a talkative mood, but no one seemed to mind.

He felt fine as long as he didn’t move his head at all, but the moment he did, he was dizzy again. _:Yfandes, this isn’t much fun: _It was easier to Mindspeak than to talk out loud, not to mention more private.

_:Be patient, love: _

_:Seriously. I don’t want to keep taking a drug that makes me feel like this. What’s the point?: _

She lifted her head, nudging the toddler in his lap to one side and re-settling her muzzle across his knees; the two little girls muttered their complaints, but she ignored them. _:Chosen, it’s temporary. You just need to get used to it. Besides, I’m noticing one thing that you aren’t feeling: _

_:What?: _The little boy was tugging on his braids now, and it was very distracting.

_:You’re not ruminating on how everything is doomed forever. That seems like a good sign: _

He hadn’t noticed. _:Really?: _

_:It’s quite noticeable from the outside, trust me: _She snuffed at his hand.

_:It’s hard to be gloomy when you have littles climbing all over you: _Weren’t they shy of strangers at all?

_:I don’t think it’s only that. Just give it time, all right? An’dora knows what she’s doing: _

The Healer had spent five whole minutes ‘reading’ him with her Healing-Sight before measuring out the morning’s dose, muttering to herself; Vanyel wondered what she was Looking at. She did seem skilled – and it would placate Yfandes if he went along with it. _:Fine:_

* * *

The shaman had told Dara to come back at sundown the next day, and she was there exactly on time, fidgeting, as the sun slipped below the horizon.

_Please let us go please please please… _She tried to quiet the litany in the back of her mind. It wouldn’t help to get too hopeful and then be disappointed.

She had spent the morning at the bazaar, renting a stall to sell some of her gems. It had been a lot of fun – she got to yell and heckle people, joining in with the other stall-holders. There was an odd sort of camaraderie to it.

Need had even roused her to go shout at a man who was trying to cheat a woman by selling her a fraudulent mage-artifact. It hadn’t been very high-stakes, she hadn’t needed to fight or anything, but she felt good about it.

Rolan found it very amusing. _You missed a calling as a merchant, _he had teased her.

It all seemed obvious enough to Dara. As a child, she had always been looking for ways to earn an extra copper here and there. The best was when she could take advantage of someone else’s laziness or waste – she remembered being seven or eight years old and following the wool-cart around town, picking up the bits of fleece that the wool-merchant had discarded as discoloured or dirty, washing them, carding them, and selling them to housewives who came to use her mother’s laundry.

She had spent the afternoon checking in on Vanyel, who seemed fine, if not entirely like himself, and then wandering about looking for a short-term job. There were lots of menial options, like refilling the water-troughs or lighting the lampposts at night, and Dara wouldn’t have minded that, she found repetitive work soothing – as long as it wasn’t sewing, she much preferred carrying heavy things – but she had hoped to find something that would be more skilled, and higher-paying.

It was seeing the little scribe’s stall that had inspired her. Not much call for writing in the Valdemaran script, here, and she couldn’t write in Jkathan at all, but she was fluent in Rethwellani and Karsite. Neither of which was all that highly in demand, but the skills were even rarer. Dara had sidled up to the scribe, offered to give him half her profits if he let her share his stall, and then spent the rest of the afternoon spreading the word amongst all her new friends, advertising her services. She hoped for at least a few customers tomorrow. It wasn’t as much fun as being a mercenary, getting to look glamorous and dangerous in riding-leathers with daggers in her sleeves, but it would keep her in Kata’shin’a’in.

She had thought to take her coin-satchel out of their tent and keep it with her, now that Vanyel wasn’t there in the daytime. It would be _awful _if it got stolen. All that hard work.

“Dara of Valdemar?”

Her head spun around so fast that her neck cricked. “Ke’valen!”

His toothy smile warmed her to the core. “Dara! Shaman Tre’haren sent me to find you. I hope your friend is better?”

“I think so. He’s still resting today. An’dora is taking very good care of him. I’m almost glad this happened.”

Ke’valen’s eyes twinkled. “As they say, no disaster without some benefit.” He chuckled, which meant it was probably another of his damned proverbs, and held out his arm, gallantly. “Walk with me?”

Dara let him take her elbow. It was very hard to imagine someone as cheerful and friendly as Ke’valen swearing blood-feud – though she remembered the darkness that had flashed across his face when she asked about it. He hadn’t given the story, and she hadn’t asked.

_It is done, _he had said, _and I belong to our Goddess now. Perhaps it was always meant to be. There is no such thing as coincidence, only mortals adrift in the winds of fate. _

Dara was dubious about that part, it seemed like you could always see a pattern but that didn’t mean it was there, but she hadn’t wanted to argue.

“Herald Dara of Valdemar.”

The shaman’s face was in shadow, where he stood in the lee between two stone buildings, Karna at his side.

“Tre’haren shena Vuy she'edras,” Dara said, politely. She still found the shaman very intimidating. In hindsight, it was hard to believe that she had marched right up to the Old City and demanded an audience with him. And then asked him to break with all of their past traditions, and let outsiders, including a mage, into the heart of the Plains. _How was I so bold? _

She had steeled herself with a cup of ale from Jor’ethan Camp and a climb to the top of the bear-statue, was part of the answer. After hearing all the young men of the clan cheering for her, Dara always felt like she could do anything.

“I have walked the Moonpaths,” the shaman said, “and asked the question.” A dramatic pause. “Your request will be granted.”

_What? _Dara managed not to jump up and down from sheer glee, but it was a near thing. She bobbed her head. “Thank you, shaman.”

“You must go at the end of the trade season,” he said. “Karna will go with you, and she is needed here until then, to train the apprentices from all of the Clans.”

“Remind me when that is?” Dara said.

“A moon after Midsummer,” Karna answered for the shaman. “About forty days.”

Well over a month. Vanyel wasn’t going to be pleased about that. Oh well. “Thank you!” Dara said again. “This means a lot to us.” Was she being too effusive?

Karna bowed her head. “I think perhaps you are the ones to do us a service, Herald of Valdemar. If it is true, and the one who was called Ma’ar lives… I fear desperately for the future of our people.” She raised her eyes, blue and piercing. “You are visited by a _leshy’a Kal’enedral. _Foolish to call you an outsider. And they say Foresight is sent by the gods. If you have visions of this place, that you have never seen – I would not be the one to deny its importance.”

There were a lot of things Dara didn’t say. That they weren’t at all sure Vanyel could defeat Leareth at all – that Vanyel, even now, wasn’t sure that was what he wanted to do. Surely Karna would be utterly horrified at the prospect that they might negotiate a treaty with him instead. And she knew Vanyel hadn’t mentioned the full story, of exactly what Leareth wanted to do with the power he sought.

“Thank you for understanding,” was all she said.

A sound at her shoulder. Dara knew it was Rolan before she turned. _:Rolan? What are you doing here?: _

_:A moment, Chosen: _He didn’t block her, exactly, but she felt how his mind receded; most of his attention was elsewhere.

The shaman, to her surprise, bowed deeply. “Guardian.”

_What? _

Rolan’s blue eyes were locked on the Shin’a’in man. _Is he Mindspeaking to him? _Dara knew he could Mindspeak to anyone, Gifted or not, but he very rarely did.

“I see,” the shaman said. “Thank you.”

_:Rolan, what–:_

_:Chosen, I said a moment: _His mindvoice was like a slap, and Dara flinched back.

The shaman stepped back. “I will keep that in mind.”

Rolan nudged at Dara’s shoulder. _:I am sorry, Chosen. We can go now: _

Dara was still hurt, and took a step away from him. _:Are you going to tell me what just happened?: _

A chuckle. _:You could say I pulled rank: _

That wasn’t really an answer, but Dara didn’t push; she didn’t feel like getting into another fight right now. “All right, let’s go.”

* * *

Dara was deep in thought, which was why she didn’t see the cutpurse coming.

Kata’shin’a’in had thieves, of course, it was a city and all cities had pickpockets, but Dara hadn’t worried much about it. A young, fit person with a sword on her hip wasn’t an appealing target, even if she was female.

Apparently that wasn’t enough to dissuade this particular thief. Either he hadn’t noticed her sword, or he was perceptive enough to realize that she was woolgathering, oblivious to her surroundings.

In the crush of people, she hadn’t even felt him cut through the strap – he must have had a sharp knife. All she felt was the sudden tug, the rip of leather giving way, and then the weight of her satchel leaving her hip.

Taking ninety-three gold _daari_. All her coin, hard-earned, meant to get them through the next however many months.

Dara’s neck twisted around, she caught a glimpse of a grimy face, and she spun and started running. “THIEF! STOP!” _:Rolan!: _

Rolan was nearly at the other end of the city, at one of the few open pastures that had any grass left. He wouldn’t be able to help her.

Dara barrelled through the crowd, knocking people out of the way, eyes fixed on that darting figure. Tears were smarting in her eyes. She was an _idiot_, they were going to lose everything and it was all her fault and she wouldn’t even be able to pay the stupid Healer for the stupid medicines that Vanyel needed. She had been so confident that everything would turn out all right. That she could take care of it.

No. Unacceptable. She was going to catch him, no cutpurse was going to walk off with _her _gold.

–At her side, Need flared to life, finally roused by her distress. _:?:_

_:Thief!: _Dara sent, drawing the sword in a single motion.

One mercy – she was in very good condition, better than she had ever been in her life, thanks to her mysterious benefactor the _leshy’a Kal’enedral _and their nightly sparring. She was gaining ground on the thief. _Oh no you are NOT getting away from me! _Anger spurred her legs even faster.

They tore around a tent, the thief knocking over a stall, Dara leaping and dodging rolling onions and potatoes. “STOP! THIEF!”

Her chest ached, there was a cramp in her side, and she was furious enough to breathe fire.

The thief dared a glance over his shoulder, then darted between two stalls, to the yelping alarm of the stallkeeper. Dara, moving with the effortless grace that Need always gave her, pivoted on the balls of her feet and followed. For once, she and the sword were in perfect accord.

They were on a narrow path between two long rows of awnings, it was one of the service-ways where merchants and small vendors moved their supplies. Dara was barely three yards behind now, gaining steadily.

The thief tripped.

Too late, Dara felt Need’s hardening resolve – and too late, she tried to want to stop it. But she didn’t, actually, want to stop it in time.

It felt like she was observing from a great distance, flailing against a pane of glass, as the thief – a boy, only a boy – started to rise to his knees, and she ran him through with the blade, right up to the hilt. 

_Oh. No. _

His falling weight yanked the sword from her hands, and Dara stumbled to a halt, lungs burning, legs trembling, sweat dripping down into her eyes.

The youngster lay on his side, knees tucked in, both hands around the hilt of the sword, which protruded just below his breastbone. He tugged at it, mouth moving soundlessly, blood dribbling from the corner of his mouth.

_Oh, gods… _Dara dropped to her knees, grabbing his hands. “No, don’t, don’t take it out, you’ll bleed to death, no–”

The boy stared at her for a moment, brown eyes wide and frightened in a filth-covered face, lank hair falling into his eyes. He looked about fourteen, and he wasn’t Shin’a’in; she thought his features were Jkathan.

Then his eyes rolled back in his head, and he went limp. His breathing rasped, blood trickling from the corner of his mouth.

“No! Don’t die!” Dara was frantically trying to think, but it was impossible, her mind was a howling storm of anger and confusion and regret. _I just want to take back the last five minutes, is that too much to ask. _

A shadow fell across her, and Dara looked up into the shocked face of a Shin’a’in merchant.

“Help!” she said, desperately. “Get a Healer! I, he stole all my money, I panicked, but I didn’t, I didn’t mean to hurt him…”

The merchant nodded, shortly, and then turned and sprinted away.

Others were approaching now, quiet footfalls.

Dara felt Need stir. _:?:_

_:Need, no! That was bad! He’s just a kid, can’t you see?: _And scrawny, under all that dirt. Hungry. She wondered where his family was from, or if he even had family here – maybe packs of street-orphans came to Kata’shin’a’in in summer, for all she knew.

He hadn’t had any idea that he was stealing ninety-three gold pieces. No one who wasn’t insane would just carry all their money around in a satchel like that.

_:Oh: _A dusty, apologetic voice.

_:You’d better be sorry!: _And the rest was sinking in, now. _:Need, I’m going to be in so much trouble! What if I get us kicked out of the city?: _She didn’t know what the laws were around murder, which was an oversight, she was a goddamned idiot and she should have at least checked. _:I’m this close to throwing you in the damned well!: _

A flinch. Need didn’t like that idea.

_:Fix it: _Need send _:Can fix it. Not too late: _

_:What?: _That didn’t make any sense.

_:Heal him. Not too late: _A rusty-sounding grumble.

_:What do you mean?: _

_:Heal him: _Need’s mindvoice was still distant, absent, like someone talking in their sleep – but it was clearer than Dara had ever heard from her before. She sounded irritated. _:Not a woman, but I’ll make an exception. Since he’s only a lad: _

_:Wait. You’re a Healer too?: _That just seemed completely unfair.

The sword ignored her. _:Pull me out. Slowly: _

_:No! He’ll bleed out!: _

_:Do it now: _There was an alertness and a hardness in Need’s mindvoice that hadn’t been there before.

The boy was already dying, Dara thought; his face was parchment-white and she wasn’t sure he was breathing anymore. Even if the Shin’a’in merchant was on his way with a Healer right now, he was going to be too late.

_This is a bad idea. _She was going to do it anyway.

Very slowly and carefully, she reached in, gripped the pommel of the sword, and started to slide it out.

_:Slower!: _Need sent. _:Gentle. Good: _

And to Dara’s shock and amazement, as she drew the two-and-a-half-foot blade out of the boy’s stomach, she watched the wound heal in its wake. For a moment she caught a very disconcerting glimpse of insides, but then it was gone, muscle closing, skin over it…and then there was only a blood-soaked rip in his ragged shirt, a large pool of blood soaking into the dust behind him, and an angry red scar.

The boy coughed, retching, more blood dribbling onto the dirt – and then he took a rasping breath.

_:Put me in his hand: _Need sent. _:Couldn’t get everything: _

Dara, with shaking fingers, reached out to take the youngster’s cold, mottled hand, and wrap his limp fingers around the hilt of the sword. _:Hurry: _she sent.

_:Don’t you hurry me: _Dara had the sense of someone cuffing her ear. _:I’m getting to it: _

Another shadow fell across their bodies. Dara lifted her head. “I’m sorry–”

She cut off, as the man in brown robes slid down from Rolan’s back, blades winking at his sides. “Who has disturbed the peace?”

“I’m sorry! I didn’t mean to!” Dara felt fresh tears spring to her eyes. “I just, I have a magic sword and sometimes she overreacts, but she apologized and Healed him…” She trailed off. Put like that, it sounded like the least believable tale she could imagine.

“I see.” The unfamiliar Swordsworn, an older man with greying hair, moved a step closer, gazing down at her. “What befell you?”

“He stole my coin-satchel,” Dara said thickly, shamefaced. “I know that wasn’t worth killing him over, and that’s probably against your Laws, but it was a _lot _of money, it’s everything I have, my friend is ill and I have to pay for a Healer, and I was scared–” She realized she was babbling, and cut herself off.

Rolan wasn’t saying anything, which only made her feel worse.

“I see.” The man knelt, stiffly. He laid two fingers against the boy’s neck, checking his pulse. “Ah.” He seemed relieved. “Let me see that blade.”

“Um, I don’t think she’s done.”

“No mind. I recognize it. That is Embra’s blade.”

“What?” Oh. She remembered now, Shavri said she had gotten the sword in k’Treva Vale from a Shin’a’in Swordsworn.

“I see she has moved on to another bearer.” His eyes fixed on her, unsmiling. “One who is perhaps too young for that burden.”

Dara gulped. “Am I… How much trouble am I in?” _Please, please, don’t kick us out of the city. _Vanyel would be so upset with her. Maybe she could claim it wasn’t his fault, and go wait in Jkatha without him, but then he would be _alone _here and that seemed like a very, very bad idea right now.

His eyes softened. “I think you will come with me to our shaman, to be counselled. You are not ready to bear this particular blade.”

Somehow that was almost worse. Dara blinked hard, and nodded; she couldn’t quite manage words.

The Kal’enedral reached out and gripped her shoulder. “Listen to me, child. No damage is done, this time. I know you will be more careful in future.”

_I’m not a child. _But the worst part was, maybe she was, in the ways that mattered. _One who is perhaps too young for it. Not ready to bear this blade. _

They had sent her with Vanyel because they trusted her, and she was failing that trust, making mistakes, the village had been a mistake, leaving Vanyel behind to go to Velvar had been a mistake – albeit a lucrative one – and this had certainly been one.

Dara squeezed her eyes shut. _I’m never going to be a good King’s Own. _

And Rolan was there, flowing back around her shields, through the gap she always left open for him. _:That’s quite enough, Dara: _He softened the words with a rush of love. _:You know I am very proud of you. Of course you make mistakes. You are only human, and you are young and inexperienced. I could hardly expect different: _

Damn it, did her own Companion think she wasn’t mature enough for this?

_:Stop: _Blazing blue in her mind, blotting out everything. _:That is not what I said. I Chose you, Dara. You ARE good enough: _A note of apology. _:I have perhaps not been supporting you enough. I am sorry: _

There was still an itchy note of wrongness in her gut, she wanted something to be different and she didn’t know what, but Dara stumbled to her feet and wove her way to fling her arms around his neck. _:I love you, Rolan:_

* * *

Vanyel tried to smile at the girl. She was about six, jet-black hair in neat braids, and she was practically vibrating. “Can I ride on your _leshy’a-_horse? Please please please?”

An’dora’s voice drifted in from somewhere further off in the beehive-cluster of tents. “Kara, out! I told you, let him be.”

“It’s fine!” Vanyel called. “Kara, I don’t mind, but you should ask Yfandes. She’s her own person.”

“Thank you!” The child beamed at him, and then dashed away, leaving the curtain of beads tinkling in her wake.

_:’Fandes, you’re about to get a visitor: _he sent. _:I hope you don’t mind: _

_:Of course not, love: _

A moment later, An’dora pushed her way through. “I am sorry about that. I tell them to stay out, and they do not listen.”

“Really, don’t worry about it.” He had told An’dora he wanted quiet for a while, but littles didn’t count.

An’dora squatted next to him. “You feel well?”

“Fine, I guess.” It was his second full day here. He wasn’t as groggy today, and he could move around without feeling dizzy. “My head feels weird.”

“It troubles you?”

“No, not in a bad way. Just odd.” It wasn’t like one of Melody’s blocks, or like anything he had ever experienced, really, though it reminded him of the numbness and distance from everything that Moondance’s stimulant had given him. Not as extreme, and minus the sharp-edged alertness. Everything was just a little slower and softer, muted. Quiet. It was hard to think, and he found himself losing track of things, but that might be just because he was still catching up on sleep.

He wasn’t sure how he felt about it, but every time he complained to Yfandes, she started listing off all the reasons she approved.

“Your friend is here,” An’dora said. “I will tell her to come back later, if you wish to rest.”

“It’s fine.” He had been getting a bit antsy anyway. “I’d like to see her.”

“Is there anything I can bring for you? Something to eat or drink?”

“…Really, I don’t need anything.” An’dora seemed so determined to coddle him. It was sort of nice; she was surprisingly good at fussing over him without making him feel smothered, like Lady Treesa would.

_:She has a lot of practice: _Yfandes sent, amused. _:And I think it is cheering you up: _

An’dora smiled, reached to fluff his pillows, and then left. “Dara!” he heard her calling in the distance.

Dara, when she slipped in, looked very subdued. “Vanyel, I’m really sorry to bother you–”

“What? You aren’t bothering me.” He sat up straighter, blinking hard. _Come on, wake up._ “What’s going on?”

Dara held up both hands. “First, please don’t panic. Everything’s fine.”

That wasn’t exactly reassuring. Though it was hard to feel very upset about it. “Don’t panic about _what_? Dara, tell me.”

“I, um, there might’ve been some trouble…” Her eyes were downcast.

“Please just spit it out.”

Her shoulders sagged. “A cutpurse tried to take our money. I got really mad, I let Need – we almost killed him! And he was just a boy, I didn’t realize… Then Need Healed him. Apparently she can do that.” She gulped. “And then one of the Kal’enedral hauled me off in front of the shaman and he lectured me for half the afternoon, and I – then he wanted to look at Need, and he _did _something, and…can you just look?”

“Look at what?”

Dara held out the sword, sheathed, balanced across her palms.

“What?”

“Use your mage-sight,” she prompted.

Oh. Right. “Sorry, I’m a bit slow today.” He let his hand drift out, closing his eyes, leaning into his Othersenses.

_Oh. _The breath left him in a quiet gasp. That was…different.

The sword blazed in his Sight, practically throwing off sparks of mage-energy. It had been clear before that it was a powerful magical artifact, but only when he looked up close; now, it felt like it would be obvious from a mile away.

_:Hello, young man: _A woman’s voice, and not the dusty mumble from before; she sounded exactly like Kayla, the weaponsmaster back in Haven, if Kayla were thirty years older and about three times as crotchety. _:I’ll hold off on saying it’s a pleasure to meet you: _

_:…You’re talking to me: _he sent, half-awed.

A dry snort. _:Your powers of observation are astounding: _

“Dara?” he said out loud. “What happened?”

“I don’t know! I just – all of a sudden something felt very funny, like my vision was double for a moment, and then she was in my head, asking me what year it was!”

_:And then you shielded me out: _Need sent, acidly. _:Very rude of you: _

“You startled me!”

_:You still haven’t answered my question, either:_

“I don’t know what calendar to use!” Dara protested. “Vanyel, we couldn’t find one we both recognized, she doesn’t know of any of the kingdoms around here.”

Which hinted that either she was from far, far away, or had been a very long time indeed, Vanyel thought. He rubbed his eyes. _Where do I start? _Dara was looking at him with hopeful eyes. The damned sword was glowing like a beacon. He tried to kick his mind into motion; he probably ought to feel _some _way about this. They had been hoping for exactly this outcome; that Need would wake up fully, and be able to cooperate with them.

He hadn’t expected her to be so cranky. At the moment, he only felt numb, and a little annoyed to be interrupted. _Center and ground_. He reached for Yfandes, wordlessly, just to feel her presence.

“Need,” he said. “You’ve been asleep.”

_:I gathered that: _He had the definite impression that she was giving him a side-eye glare, though he didn’t know how, lacking a body, she managed to convey it in Mindspeech overtones alone.

“What woke you?” he asked.

_:If you must know, that supposed shaman called to me in the name of the Twins. Or Karanel the Fighter, to be exact. Though he named Her something different. Damned kids and their newfangled gods: _

Vanyel didn’t know what to do with that, so he let it slide. “Need, I’ll try to answer your questions, but we need more information to start. What’s the last thing that you remember clearly?”

A sigh. _:I was dreaming… YOU were in my dream. You were poking around at me: _A delicate cough, purely mental. _:You do know it’s rude to undress a sleeping woman without her consent?: _

Vanyel choked on his own saliva. “What – I wasn’t…”

_:Just because I don’t have a body anymore, doesn’t mean I don’t have private parts: _

Vanyel’s cheeks were flaming now. Dara was snickering quietly, trying to stifle it behind her hand, which wasn’t helping at all.

“Sorry,” he managed. “I didn’t realize I was being rude.” Then the rest of her words caught up. “Anymore. You used to have a body.”

_:Obviously: _

Not obviously at all. “Um, I hate to ask, but how exactly did you end up in a sword?”

A long, gusty sigh. _:I suppose I may as well show you: _

“Show us? What do you–”

And the pleasant Healers’ tent around him vanished.

_A forge. Brick-walled, dirt-floored._ _Smiling to herself, she slid the sword in her hands into the sheath, then placed it alongside the others. Twelve blades, three for each season, laid with the necessary spells of protection. Good work, she thought, letting a wisp of pride curl in her chest. Tomorrow she would take these finely-wrought, bespelled swords, a whole year’s worth of work, to the Autumn Fair, and bring home profits for the Sisterhood._

If Vanyel hadn’t recognized the feeling of being a passenger in someone else’s head, observing without being able to affect anything, he might have panicked. Instead, he forced himself to relax into it, as Karna had taught him to do with the tapestry records.

It was still very disconcerting, being in a woman’s body, watching someone else’s sturdy, capable hands smoothing down her split leather skirt.

_For Spring, the spell of Calm, for Summer, the spell of Warding, for Fall, the spell of Healing, and for Winter, the spell that attracted Luck. Spring swords generally went to headstrong young men, at their parents’ insistence, and she wondered how many youngsters’ lives she had saved from their own foolishness. With one of her Summer swords, a bodyguard might resist simple magics, invaluable to those who were not mages. The wealthy noble-born, who did not always trust their Healers, might buy a Fall sword, while their youngest sons went with Winter blades, placing their hopes and dreams in the power of Luck. _

_Once every four years, she made eleven swords instead of twelve, and forged all four spells into a single blade. They were set aside until one of the girls at the Sisterhood caught her attention, and showed herself worthy, not only as a skilled fighter but as an ethical one. She never told them the true nature of the blades, letting the youngsters think they were simply one of her ordinary, nearly unbreakable blades, spelled for Healing. ‘Simply’, she scoffed to herself. As if any of her work was ordinary. They would have been damned fine gifts even if they were only what she claimed they were. _

_One lay beneath the floor of the forge right now, waiting for just the right home. _

The scene went still, and Need interrupted, a papery voice speaking in Vanyel’s mind. _:As you may have guessed, that was me: _A pause. _:The woman, I mean. In case that wasn’t clear: _A snort. _:And the sword, but that came later: _

_The Sisterhood was a peculiar group; part temple, part militia, part mage-school. They welcomed all females, at least those who were willing to learn and work hard. Those girls who were Mage-Gifted were taught the use of their powers; those who wished to fight, learned all they needed to make an excellent living as mercenaries. Others supposed the group, as Healers – either with herb and knife, or with Gifts – or with other crafts, a broad range of them. _

_With their training complete, the young women were encouraged to go out and make their way in the outside world, although the could remain if they chose. As she had chosen to. A very select few joined the Priests of the Twins at the temple within their complex. _

_The Twins. Two sets of gods and goddesses, Kerenal and Dina, Karanel and Dara; Healer, Crafter, Fighter, and Hunter. _

_There were few rules, here, and only one requirement was absolute – that of celibacy. The woman who was to become Need had never found that to be a problem. _

Everything froze again for a moment.

_:I thought you might want some background: _Need jumped in again. _:You’re welcome: _

Vanyel stumbled, trying to stay in the flow of the memory. He wished she would stop interrupting, though he supposed the sudden flood of context was useful. Not that he knew what to do about it. He had never heard of the paired gods and goddesses she called the Twins, much less of an order known as the Sisterhood of Sword and Spell.

_(A shift) _

_She was tired; she tired easily now, in her old age, joints swelling and aching. She didn't work as much anymore, she had reluctantly learned to rest when her body demanded it, and the Healers did their best._

_So she sat, sipping tea, and watched the girls train. Damn it but there wasn’t a single one worthy of her year-sword. _

_Except one. _

_The problem was, Vena wasn’t a fighter at all, but an apprentice mage. Currently exercising with the other mages, the same warm-ups that the fighters used – here at the Sisterhood, they understood the importance of mages keeping fit. _

_Well, it was true that she had started out a fighter, not a mage. She knew it was possible for someone clever and hard-working to master both disciplines. Perhaps someone like her apprentice. _

_A conundrum, that was for certain. _

Another pause.

_:Brace yourself: _Need sent. _:This is the exciting part: _

Vanyel pushed back his irritation. It was hard to relax into the flow of the memory when she kept tossing in random asides. She could have been gentler, too – he felt yanked to and fro, buffeted by eachchange of scene, he couldn’t find his balance. 

_(A shift) _

_The woods were peaceful. _

_Enormous trees surrounded her as she rode, so vast that six men could barely have formed a circle around the trunks. _

_She was glad to be going home. The autumn fair was ever-more tiring, in recent years. _

_…Something was wrong. _

_A whiff of smoke, mixing into the pine-scent, but there shouldn’t have been any campfires. Alarmed, she dug her heels into her mare’s side; the elderly beast whuffed out a breath, startled into a canter, eyes rolling; she smelled the smoke as well, only growing thicker as they drew closer._

_She rode into the clearing holding the Sisterhood to face a scene of carnage._

_There were bodies everywhere, most but not all female. Smoking ruins, the blackened frames of a few buildings standing like loose teeth in a skull. Nothing left alive. _

_She was numb, frozen to the saddle, and her mind could only form one question, an endless litany: Why? They were hardly a wealthy order. They had no secrets, not even the mage-blades; the technique was known to anyone who was both a smith and a mage, and had the patience to master it. _

_Who? How? Why? _

_She yelped as Vena sprinted out of the forest into the clearing, coughing, cheeks tearstained, hair full of pine needles and ash. _

Vanyel flinched away from it, nearly falling out of the memory-immersion. He had seen death and destruction, plenty of it, but this was as bad as anything he remembered from the Karsite border.

_:It gets worse than this: _Need sent grimly, and firmly pulled him back into the midst of it.

_(A shift) _

_They were in her forge – though little remained of the walls and ceiling, somehow it still offered some bare comfort. _

_Vena had been in the woods collecting berries when the attack began, and had managed to hide in one of the smaller trees, and watch. She had answers now, and none of them made her any happier. _

_The ‘who’ was Wizard-Heshain, a mage-warlord whose name she had heard spoken of in fearful tones, but who had certainly never before showed interest in a peaceful temple order. Vena had described the livery she had seen, and she recognized the description of his badge. _

_How: a large, well-armed force had marched in, both fighters and mages, and with cold, brutal efficiency, they had set fire to every building, sought out and killed each and every adult fighter. Every adult mage. Every craftswoman. All of the apprentices who were not mages. _

_Vena said there had been no unnecessary theatrics, no excess shows of force, not even rape. Only slaughter. The attackers had left behind their dead, but stripped of any weapons and anything that might identify them. _

_Why: the fate of the mage-gifted apprentices told her enough. Vena had watched as the girls were bound at the wrists and chained together, herded into carts, and taken away. _

_Wizard Heshain had taken them to augment his own powers, she thought, perhaps with direct power-theft, perhaps merely by subverting and bending them to his will. _

_Which was unacceptable, and not only because her heart ached for the Sisterhood. If Heshain succeeded, his power would only increase, and no man who sought power in such a way ought to be allowed to have it. _

_Unacceptable. She almost wanted to laugh at herself, at the hot defiance that rose in her chest. He had to be stopped. _

_By an old crippled woman and a half-trained girl. Right. Very plausible._

_If only she had still been young enough to fight. Her skill, as a mage and as a swordswoman, was adequate to the task – that was no boast, she knew it with deep certainty – but not her body. Vena had youth and health on her side, but not the training. _

_…It was that juxtaposition that gave her the idea. If only they could merge into one, they would have all they needed. _

_It was a plan out of a child’s fever-dream, the finest and most tenuous of threads to hang all of her hopes on – but it was all they had. _

_She sent Vena into the woods, ostensibly to gather herbs, but really as a pretext to get her out from underfoot. She had only ever heard of this being done once, and not with a spell-wrought blade – and it might have been legend rather than truth. _

_It was utter madness, but maybe the anger and grief had driven her mad. They need me, there’s nothing else I can do… _

_With trembling fingers, she retrieved her last year-sword, the spells of all four seasons hammered deeply into the steel, out from its hiding place under the floor. _

_She heated the forge, placed the sword in the fire, and called her magic to herself, casting one final spell – half magic, half a last desperate prayer for the Twins. _

_When the blade was white-hot, humming with the pressure of her magic, she set it in its clamps on the side of the forge, point outwards. _

Vanyel realized, too late, what she was about to do, and made a frantic effort to wrench himself out of the memory. He didn’t want to see this–

_She ran her body onto the sword. _

_There was a white-hot agony, so great that it stopped being ‘pain’ at all and became something else entirely, until it stopped being even that. There was a feeling impossible to describe – wrenching dislocation, disorientation – _

_And then everything stopped, and there was nothing at all. No sight, sound, any kind of senses – no body. _

_She hung in the Void for a timeless moment, and the Void asked a question. _

_Yes, she thought, yes yes yes. _

_–And the world rushed back in, light and sound and colour, sensations, emotions. Grief. Everything sharp-edged and clear, so raw it was almost unbearable. _

_Vena wept over the body of her teacher. She was Vena, sharing her senses, borrowing her limbs._

_Elation surged through her. It had worked! She had done it! _

_Testing, she reached for her memories. Good. She was one with the sword, and it seemed that all of her abilities, as both mage and fighter, had come through intact. Experimenting, she tried to move the girl’s hand. Very good! Vena need only relinquish control, and she would have all the skill of a fully trained fighter. _

_The girl was still sobbing. _

_Oh. Right. Probably she ought to let her know at some point that she wasn’t exactly dead. _

_:I will spare you the gruesome battle scene: _Need sent – and Vanyel found himself tossed out of the memory, sprawled on the cat-skin rug, screaming.

Heart hammering in his chest, he tried to wrestle his breathing under control. _That really isn’t what I wanted to see today. _The ghost of that awful, molten pain, and the even worse nothingness that had followed, still hung in his mind.

Why did everyone here keep wanting to show him fully immersive memories of literally the worst things he could imagine?

_Half the horizon turned to blue-white fire–_

Vanyel struggled to push it away. _No, please, I can’t right now–_

“Vanyel?” he heard Dara saying, her voice shaky. “Are you–”

_:Chosen!: _Yfandes was reaching for him as well, half-frantic. _:Chosen, it’s all right, I’m here–: _Her mindvoice was strident, and hurt his head.

“What is the meaning of this?” An’dora’s voice, and she sounded furious. “Dara! What are you doing?”

It was all happening at once, too many voices. Vanyel clamped his hands over his ears and raised his shields against Yfandes’ panic, trying to carve out a pocket of stillness and silence so that he could think.

Dara whimpered. “I didn’t–”

“Out! Now!” Angry footsteps. “Stand right outside and do not go anywhere! I will want an explanation.”

Another mumbled apology. More footsteps. Vanyel felt the cushions shift slightly as An’dora knelt beside him, cloth rustling. “Hey, hey, hey. Just breathe.” She pulled his shoulders into her lap, cradling his head to her breast. “It’s all right to cry. No need to fight it.”

She was being very mothering, but Vanyel didn’t mind – right at the moment, he was glad to have _anyone _there. To be held. He could imagine it was Savil…

He sniffled, feeling himself slowly relax. “I’m sorry,” he mumbled.

“Don’t be. No shame in it.”

It was easier to calm down than he had expected; he took slow breaths through his nose, in and out, and the quasi-physical echoes of pain receded, leaving him drained and limp.

“Better now?” An’dora said softly.

He disentangled himself from her arms and sat up. “Yes. Sorry.”

“You stop apologizing. Now, what did your friend say to you, that has you so upset? I could kick her down the well for it.”

“Wasn’t anything she said. She didn’t mean to.” He dragged a hand over his face. “Just wanted my advice on something… Ask Dara. It happened to her to. I don’t really want to talk about it.” He was trying very hard not to think about it.

“I understand. I will ask her.” An’dora’s deep-set eyes were tight with worry. “I am still quite displeased.”

“It wasn’t her fault.” Vanyel slumped back against the pile of pillows. “Don’t be too hard on her. I’ll be fine.”

She tutted. “I mislike it when people upset my patients. You rest, now. I will be back soon.”

Vanyel closed his eyes. Something was tugging at his attention… Oh, right. He unshielded a little. _:Sorry, ‘Fandes: _

_:Are you all right?: _Her mindvoice was much quieter, and if she was hurt that he had blocked her out, she was keeping it to herself.

_:I will be in a minute: _He was more shaken than he had wanted to let on to An’dora. _:Did you catch any of that?: _

_:Yes, I was riding along: _He felt her shudder. _:I know Dara didn’t mean to, but she really could have showed better judgement: _A pause. _:It looks like An’dora is about to give her the talking-to she deserves. I’m going to sneak in and listen, I bet this will be good: _

Outside the tent, he could hear Dara speaking, too low to catch the words, and then An’dora’s answer, loud and clear. “You showed him WHAT? What were you thinking, child? Are you truly so stupid?”

Vanyel curled up and pulled the blanket over his head.

* * *

Dara sat at the top of the Pretera'sedrin tower, legs dangling, watching the sunset. She was by herself, which was how she wanted it.

_Why can’t I ever do anything right? _

She knew she was whining, which was why she was shielding Rolan out; blocking him was petty, but letting him hear her thoughts right now would be even worse.

_This isn’t fun anymore. _

It was all too much, one thing after another, for days. Vanyel’s problems. The Foresight dream. Having to talk to the shaman. Nearly having all their money stolen. Almost killing someone by accident _again – _the thief’s face still flashed into her mind every so often, grey and clammy with blood leaking from his mouth. Being lectured by the shaman. Need waking up. Having to admit the whole mess to Vanyel – she would have preferred to put it off, she really hadn’t wanted to worry him, but Rolan had said it wasn’t fair to hide it. Need’s _absolutely horrible _origin story, it was going to give her nightmares for sure and she wasn’t at all surprised that it had upset Vanyel even more. Having An’dora shout at her in front of half of Pretera’sedrin Camp, and knowing she deserved it.

_Why does everything have to be awful? _

She felt even worse because she knew she was overreacting and being immature; she had expected it to be hard, the point of this journey wasn’t for her to have fun. And here she was, sulking at the top of a tower because she wasn’t mature enough to handle it.

Still, it felt like every single thing was wrong with the world, and it was especially hard to bear in a city full of strangers, with no one there she really felt like she could talk to. Dara hadn’t felt especially lonely or homesick before this point – she had plenty of new friends here – but she did now.

She missed her room. She missed Kerrill, and the familiar hallways of the Palace. It was only a week or so to Midsummer and she would be missing the party, the other Herald-trainees would be climbing up into the barn-loft and getting drunk, and she would be eight hundred miles away in Kata’shin’a’in, trying not to ruin everything by being an idiot.

_Pull yourself together, Herald. _She tried to sit up straighter. All she could do was make the best of it. What was it that Vanyel had said to her? _You will make mistakes. Sometimes the consequences will be a lot worse than this. You can’t let it break you._

She knew that was right, and it was still very hard to listen to that wisdom right now.

Need was sitting next to her, sheathed, and Dara had all of her shields up. She hadn’t been ready to face the sword yet.

Sooner or later she had to. _Come on. Just get it over with. _It wasn’t going to get any easier if she waited.

Dara sighed, opened her shields a little, and laid her hand on the hilt.

–The mental sound of a throat being cleared. _:That: _Need sent icily, _:was very rude: _

“What?” Dara was strongly of the opinion that Need was the one who had been rude, not her.

_:Shielding me out like that. Don’t you realize, I can only see and hear through your eyes and ears?: _

Oh. Dara did remember that moment, from the memory – the bodiless, senseless nothing. “I’m sorry. I didn’t realize.”

_:Stupid of you. Please don’t do it again. It’s quite unpleasant: _

Need’s mindvoice was dry, but there was a hint of pleading in it. “I won’t!” Dara said quickly. “I promise.” A pause. “If you promise not to ever do that again! You really upset my friend.”

A scoff. _:Men! Such babies: _

Dara had to take a slow deep breath through her nose and count to ten; she was very, very tempted to fling the sword off the side of the damned tower. “Need. I’m serious. You don’t – you have no idea, all right? Besides, I got in loads of trouble again, and it’s your fault.” All right, maybe not ‘loads’, An’dora had calmed down and apologized after a few minutes, and even Rolan had said it wasn’t really her fault and it had just been bad timing. But nonetheless. “Haven’t you ever heard of warning people before you show them something horrible?”

Need was very quiet to a moment. _:We seem not to have gotten off on the best foot: _she sent finally. _:I think I may have lost the hang of some things:_

“Like tact?” Dara said wryly. “Manners?”

A mental snort. _:I was never much for either of those: _

Dara laughed in spite of herself. “You can say that again.” She swung her legs, watching the children running about below. Someone had a ball, and threw it.

A sigh in her head. _:I did always love littles: _

“Really?” Dara said out loud. “A crotchety old woman like you. Imagine that.”

_:Oh, I like you!: _Dara had the sense of someone playfully swiping at her hair._ :You’ve got spunk: _

They sat in silence for a few moments.

_:I do wish I hadn’t fallen asleep like that: _Need’s mindvoice was almost thoughtful, and only a little irritated.

“What happened?” Dara was very curious.

_:To be honest I’m not sure. I think perhaps…: _Dara felt an odd tickling behind her eyes._ :Oh. I’m starting to remember it now: _

She looked down at the blade, suddenly suspicious. “Need, are you using my head to think?”

_:Well, I don’t exactly have my own head, do I? I remember now, I couldn’t find any bearers except those who were un-Gifted, for a long time. I think that must be when I drifted off. Everything since… I remember bits and pieces, but it’s as though it came to me in dreams: _

“Oh.” _How old are you, really? _No point in asking again – Need didn’t know. “Do you have a name?”

_:…How embarrassing. I seem to have forgotten it:_

“Oh. That’s all right, then. Need is a fine name.” Dara let her eyes drift to the horizon. “Seems you’ve missed some things. Want a history lesson?”


	15. Chapter Fifteen

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Extra bonus chapter!!
> 
> See longer author's note at the end, but TL/DR: I'm writing a new novel, seeking beta readers, fill out this form if you’re interested: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSeCsazMhG8W6W76J__dwOcgoQCRgzzjtopl13ggQ2vvT6g0UA/viewform
> 
> ALSO! See another *hilarious* ASFTV crackfic, this one is Rolan and Taver sniping at each other in the blue place. https://archiveofourown.org/works/22096633

When Medren drifted in, he found Stef standing in front of his bed, clothing scattered everywhere, a travel-pack open in front of him.

“Going somewhere?” he said.

Stef must have been deep in thought; he didn’t answer at first, and then spun around. “What – oh. Yes.”

“Might I ask where?”

“Sunhame.” Stef said it matter-of-factly, but he couldn’t quite hide the smirk that crept across his face.

“You’re kidding.” Medren pulled out the chair in front of his desk and sagged down into it. “You. Going to Sunhame.”

“I have to. King Randale will be in meetings all day and he needs me.”

“And I bet you’re just torn up over it.” Medren rolled his eyes. “Poor Stef. What a sacrifice. You’ll miss the Midwinter Festival, all the parties, you’ll be in stuffy meetings all day pretending to be part of the furniture…” 

Stef didn’t deign that with an answer, just went on cramming clothes into his bag.

“You know,” Medren said, spinning around to sit backwards on the chair with his forearms resting on the back, “if you just shove everything in there, it’ll come out crumpled. Hardly professional.”

Stef stuck out his tongue.

“I hope you’re going to be on your best behaviour,” Medren added.

“And what is that supposed to mean, exactly?” Stef said, coolly.

“…Just, if you set off some kind of scandal…”

Stef turned, folding his arms. “I don’t know what you’re implying.”

_Oh dear. _Medren sighed. “Just, be careful, all right? And, er, maybe don’t go around seducing courtiers.”

“How about you quit lecturing me?” Stef glared at him. “I’m not stupid, Medren. I’ll be good and I won’t offend anyone.” He made a disgusted sound. “Doesn’t mean I have to like it.”

* * *

Dara turned, hands pausing in the process of putting away some of Vanyel’s books. “Van, are you sure you’re feeling better? You could stay another day…”

“I wasn’t ill in the first place.” Aside from the deeply frustrating side-effects of the herb An’dora had been giving him, but the dizziness and nausea had subsided after the first day. Emotionally, he felt steadier than he had in a long time, even if it came along with a certain strange numbness that made him absentminded.

_:Still a vast improvement: _Yfandes prodded.

It did make Kata’shin’a’in a lot less overwhelming. He had gone for a walk with Yfandes the day before, all the way to the bazaar and back, and the crowds and people shouting after him had still been _unpleasant, _but he had been able to face that without wanting to flee back to his tent.

Some part of him didn’t want to leave the Pretera’sedrin Healers’ tent – it was restful here, an oasis of calm. There was no excuse to stay any longer, though. He was as caught up on sleep as he was going to get.

_:We’d best have a plan to keep it that way: _Yfandes sent. _:I don’t want you ending up back here within the week: _

_:I won’t: _He rolled his eyes. _:Stop being such a mother-hen: _

“If you’re sure,” Dara said doubtfully. “You will tell me if you’re feeling worse again, right?”

_:If you don’t, I will: _Yfandes helpfully jumped in.

_:Will you stop ganging up on me, please?: _Vanyel pasted on a smile. “Of course, Dara.”

“Good. And you’ll remember to take your herbs every day?”

_Oh for the sake of all the gods. _“Yes, Dara. An’dora says I have to come back here every morning for a week, so she can figure out the dose.” Which would become irritating very quickly, once Pretera’sedrin was a ten-minute ride from where he was sleeping, but he could try to be grateful for it. “And then she’ll give me a week’s worth to keep with me.”

“Good.” Dara turned. “I’ll have to figure out how many months’ worth I need to get before we leave. How long do you think we’ll be at Urtho’s Tower?”

“…What?” He stared at her. “I’m not going to keep taking it _forever.” _

“Why not? An’dora told me she’s pretty sure you’ll be one of the people it works well for, and in her experience it’s not something you build tolerance to, so there’s no downside and it actually works better if you’re consistent.” She ran a hand through her hair, so stiff with dust and grease that it stood out in spikes. “Anyway, didn’t she say you would probably feel awful for a few days if you stopped? And then if you start taking it _again _you get the side-effects all over until you’re used to it. I don’t see why you’d want that.”

“Dara, I can handle a few days of feeling awful, it won’t be the first–”

“How about we don’t do that while we’re eight hundred miles from anywhere? Van, I’m sorry, but right now I don’t want to take any more risks with this!”

He twisted away from her. “Dara, you aren’t my mother. Can you stop trying to manage my entire life for me?”

“I’m trying to help.” She flung up her hands. “You are _so frustrating _sometimes, I wonder why I bother.” A moment later, her expression softened. “…I’m sorry. I don’t mean that.”

_:Chosen: _Yfandes sent, her mindvoice steely. :_Please stop being difficult:_

He closed his eyes. “I’m sorry for being ungrateful, Dara. I, just…”

“I understand. I’m sorry I snapped at you.” She cleared her throat. “I had another conversation with Need yesterday.”

Vanyel leapt eagerly onto the change of topic. “Oh? What about?”

“Ethics. I told her that if I’m to bear her, we need to work _together_. She can’t just take over my body and murder people, or I’ll shield her out and keep her in my saddlebags except for emergencies.”

_:You drive a hard bargain, girl: _Vanyel blinked, startled, as Need jumped in again. Right – she was lying on the rug next to where Dara knelt, listening through her ears, and she tended to address both of them when they were in the same room.

“We have an agreement,” Dara said, a little too loudly. Maybe for Need’s benefit, to drive home the point. “Minimum force. No indiscriminate slaughter. If we hurt someone by accident, she’ll Heal them.”

Vanyel nodded, approvingly. And the other question… “Any progress on memories of our, er, acquaintance Leareth?”

_:Not sure what you’re expecting, here: _Need sent, her mindvoice curt – she almost seemed offended. _:I may well have met the man, but he would have gone by a different name at the time, and he would hardly have informed me that he was another immortal: _

Vanyel hadn’t thought of that aspect. Damn. “I can list you out some of his past names,” he offered. Which might not help – he had an approximate timeline back in Haven, in his personal notes, but there were long gaps, and Leareth hadn’t exactly confirmed many of them.

“Her memories of the time she was ‘asleep’ are confused and incomplete anyway,” Dara added. “Seems it’s hard for her to think unless she has a Gifted bearer – she was acting on instinct.”

Vanyel remembered what Leareth had said. _A spirit is not all that makes up a person. _And it seemed that Need _wasn’t, _really, a full person – unless she was partially using her bearer’s mind to provide the rest.

It was a serious downside of her strategy for immortality. Otherwise, Vanyel might have lined up some very pointed questions for Leareth the next time they spoke, about why he had gone with a method that required killing people when he had _known _about Need.

Then again, he might have only found out about her afterwards. Maybe his initial method meant that he _couldn’t _do what Need had done. And, well, it sounded like Need had relied on the active intervention of a god – in that sense, she had more in common with one of the Groveborn Companions than with Leareth, who presumably had lacked that option. 

“–the Mage Wars,” Dara said.

“–What?” Vanyel rubbed his eyes, yanked out of his wandering thoughts. “Sorry, I was woolgathering.” It kept happening.

Dara didn’t seem offended. “I said, she predates the Mage Wars. And she remembers when the Cataclysm happened.”

His chest tightened.“Oh! What does she remember?”

_:Little of the events that led up to it, I’m afraid, though of course I knew of the war with Ma’ar. The storms nearly destroyed me: _

Vanyel stared down at the blade, winking in the light. “Storms?”

_:Not ordinary storms. Mage-storms, young man. Obviously: _A scoff. _:Only reason I survived is that I was in a shielded casket in a shielded shrine in the heart of the triply-shielded Temple to Bestet, the Battle-Goddess. When I woke up, every bit of shielding was destroyed, and I was drained to the dregs: _A bitter laugh. _:By which point they’d put me in the armoury. No one could think what I was doing in there with the sacred relics. Terribly offensive: _

“Need,” Vanyel said carefully. “Can you describe these storms any more?”

She hadn’t been anywhere near the site of Urtho’s Tower – Vanyel hadn’t heard any mention of gods known as the Twins in any of Ravenwing’s memories – so the ‘storm’ most likely hadn’t been just the collapse of Urtho’s Tower. Meaning it must have been the weapon, though, come to think of it, the Star-Eyed in Ravenwing’s memory had also mentioned something to do with a Gate…

“Is it related to what happened to the Pelagirs?” That was another fallout from the Mage Wars, one of the few parts that was still known even in Valdemar. What Vanyel hadn’t known was how or why any kind of combat spell could have flooded the world with wild magic.

_:The magic-twisted lands? I would say so, young man: _A pause. Need was making a show of being dismissive and impatient, Vanyel thought, but he was picking up faint overtones of something like approval. _:And no, I don’t know what did this. I may be immortal but I’m hardly omniscient: _

“You must have guesses,” Vanyel suggested. “You were a powerful Adept who pulled off one of the most impressive feats of magic I’ve ever heard of.” There, lay on some flattery.

_:Well, yes: _A dusty mental cough. _:I suspect the effect was to rip apart the structure of all spells, releasing a great deal of destructive energy in the process. It destroyed most mage-artifacts and set-spells, including shielding, and thoroughly disrupted all the natural energy-flows. Seems it also made most mage-gifted very ill: _

The tone of her voice had changed – much less crotchety, more the dry tones of an experienced teacher, lecturing a student. Her calm manner belied the words themselves. Rip apart the structure of magic? _It’s a wonder there was any world left at all._

* * *

Sunhame at Midsummer was _hot_. The sun blazed down on them, and Shavri was glad for the shade of the enormous, leafy tree planted in the center of the courtyard. She leaned back against the trunk, closing her eyes for just a moment.

Shavri wasn’t sure how it had happened, if the conspiracy had been Lissa’s or Jisa’s or some combination of the two, but _someone _had persuaded the Queen to block out two candlemarks on the afternoon of Midsummer itself – though Karis called it the Summer Solstice – for a picnic.

The sun was high, the air was warm, and it was almost possible to forget the guards standing at each entrance or exit to the courtyard. Randi lay on his back with his head on a cushion – for propriety, he was next to Karis, and he hadn’t touched Shavri at all. Still, they _were _all out here together, something she hadn’t even imagined four years ago. _I wonder what the guards think of us? _Their Queen, the King he had married, and that King’s…mistress? What did Sunhame really think about the Healer who always stayed by King Randale’s side?

She was a little surprised to find that she didn’t care much.

Jisa was playing with little Arven on the picnic blanket, building a tower of coloured blocks – the eighteen-month-old kept knocking them over, giggling, but she seemed to be enjoying it.

She was already a very pretty child, Shavri thought, with her jet-black hair in pigtails, huge dark eyes, and her little button nose. _I wonder if she’ll come out looking like Van. _Jisa didn’t, much. Would the child be Gifted as well?

Would she even have a chance to grow up so that they could find out?

A morbid thought, and Shavri tried to push it away, but it wasn’t false. She had known of the coming war for eight years – nearly Jisa’s entire life – and it was so much worse than she had feared.

It felt like everything was already coming a part. Not a helpful frame to think about it, but it was hard to escape.

“Copper for your thoughts?”

The voice belonged to Karis, speaking in Valdemaran. Maybe out of consideration for Shavri, whose Karsite wasn’t nearly as fluent as Randi’s. _She _hadn’t had years of tutoring as a prospective heir to the throne of Valdemar.

Shavri opened her eyes, sitting up. “Sorry, just woolgathering. Our children seem to be getting along.”

“One would hope they would. They are sisters, after all.”

For a moment, Shavri stiffened, at Karis bringing that up in a public place, before she remembered that it was the official story as well.

It was very strange, to think of it that way. “I suppose they are.” Half-sisters, anyway. Someday, gods, she would have to tell Jisa her true parentage. It wasn’t fair to keep it from her for her entire life. _I have no idea how to start that conversation. _

There were going to be quite a few conversations that Shavri didn’t know how to approach, in the next few years. Boys, for one, unless Jisa somehow turned out to be shaych – in which case they would _still _need to have that conversation, though without the discussion of pregnancy and contraception.

“You want the red one?” she heard Jisa say. “Arven, can you say ‘red’?”

“Ba-ba-ba…”

“That isn’t quite it, but here you go.”

Karis chuckled. “Your daughter does well as big sister, I think.”

“Jisa’s good with people.” A thousand times better than her mother had been at the same age. Jisa had never been shy, and she could put just about anyone at ease even without using her Projective Empathy – she had, finally, gotten more disciplined about using her Gifts. Probably thanks to how angry Melody had been about the incident in the winter. It was good someone had finally hammered some sense into her. Shavri had known, vaguely, that Jisa had still been using her Gifts in ways that weren’t totally appropriate, but it had felt too hard to explain the ethics of it to a child, and she had kept pushing it off into the future.

_Not a little girl anymore_, she reminded herself.

“You are troubled,” Karis said. She lowered her voice. “You fear for our future?”

“I’m trying not to think about it.” Shavri managed a tight smile. “Not right now. You know, sometimes you have to set it aside and just rest and have fun.”

“But it is hard. I know.” Karis hesitated, and then reached out and laid one sturdy brown hand over Shavri’s. “I am glad you are here, Healer Shavri.”

Shavri’s eyes burned. “I’m glad as well.” Not even a polite lie. As much as she hated the politics happening around her, she was grateful to be in the rooms where decisions were made.

She wished there had been more time for her to talk to Karis privately. _I want to know what she’s thinking about Leareth. _The Queen had been very cagey about it, during the brief minutes they’d had with just her, Randi, and Tran – she had asked about specifics, Guard-numbers and Web-alarms, but hadn’t revealed much of her feelings.

Maybe because they were just as messy and complicated as Shavri’s, and she wasn’t any readier to open that box.

* * *

“Come on,” Dara said. “Get dressed. We’re going.”

Vanyel looked up vaguely from the parchment spread in front of him on the tent floor. “Going where?”

“It’s Midsummer. Aren’t you curious how they celebrate it?”

Vanyel lifted a hand to his brow. “It can’t be Midsummer already.”

“It is. And there’s a party!”

“Oh. Must be why Karna told me not to come tonight.”

Vanyel had been back in their tent for three days, and he had spent the last two nights with the Scrollsworn again. At Rolan’s suggestion, Dara had purchased a large roll of black felt at the bazaar, cut it into pieces, and pinned it to the inside of the tent. It did wonders to block out the sun, and keep it pleasantly cool later into the morning, which made it much easier to sleep in.

Whatever drugs the Healer at Pretera'sedrin Camp was giving Vanyel – he was still going back there every day to see her – Dara thought they were helping. He was more relaxed, and not as moody, though sometimes he would lose the track of a conversation mid-sentence. An’dora had him taking a different herb at night to help him sleep, and it knocked him out until at least noon. Which he complained about, but it seemed reasonable to Dara, given that they weren’t usually going to sleep until well after midnight. Not the healthiest schedule, but given how the memory tapestries worked, they had little choice.

Dara fidgeted, shifting her weight from one foot to the other. “Come on! Can we go?” She very much didn’t want to miss any of it. “It’ll be fun.” She could have gone without him, but that seemed rude.

“I’m coming, I’m coming. I can tell you’re excited.” Vanyel started rolling up the parchment.

Dara was practically bouncing on her heels now. “I heard there’s a giant bonfire, and people sing…”

The sun was just touching the horizon, the first lamps and torches being lit, and Kata’shin’a’in glittered all around them. Everyone wore jewelry, and their brightest clothes. Some people had their faces and bodies painted in bright colours as well.

Dara took Vanyel’s hand and almost dragged him up one of the paths. “Come on! My friends from Jor’ethan saved us a spot but I’m not sure how long they can hold it.”

“Wait up, I’m not as young and spry as you,” Vanyel grumbled, but he let her pull him along.

_:Rolan: _she sent. _:Did you find a good vantage point?: _

_:I can see well enough, love: _His mindvoice was indulgent; he was enjoying her excitement.

It was the biggest pyre that Dara had ever seen.

It seemed wasteful, there were hardly any trees on the Plains and it must all have been hauled in from Jkatha, but Dara couldn’t bring herself to care. The logs glistened with oil. There was a broad perimeter staked out with rope, and then people, sitting and standing, almost as far as she could see.

“Dara! Dara!” Voices called to her, and she wriggled through the crowd. She felt Vanyel tensing up, probably overwhelmed by the number of people, and gripped his hand harder.

The youngsters of Jor’ethan had staked out a canvas, close to the front. They had brought a keg of ale, and a pipe of something fragrant was being smoked and passed around.

Dara made the introductions. “This is my friend Vanyel, he’s a Herald of Valdemar as well…”

They sat.

“It’s starting soon!” someone hissed. “Shush!”

The sun was fully below the horizon now, and the first stars were appearing.

A very long way off, a lone voice started to sing. Dara couldn’t make out the words.

Gasps, a few celebratory whoops. Dara saw that someone had flung a single flaming torch onto the pile. Nothing much happened for a moment.

More voices joined the song.

She turned. Beside her, Vanyel was frozen, eyes staring ahead.

_:Hey: _she sent. _:Are you all right?: _

He lowered his shoulders, gave her a sheepish smile. _:Sorry. I’m fine. Song caught me by surprise: _

_:You can understand it?: _Dara still couldn’t make out any words. :_What’s it about?: _

_:Urtho: _A pause. _:Tonight we make noise, for the Mage of Silence. That was only a couple of lines, the rest is about the Goddess in her aspect as Warrior: _He shook his head. _:It’s just a weird mood to start off a party, you know: _The overtones there were complex, but foremost was grief.

For most of the people here, if they listened to the words at all, it would be straightforward. Urtho was a distant hero of their past. He had saved their people.

By sacrificing himself.

Dara could see why that would get to Vanyel.

–With a whoosh, a rope of fire rippled down the side of the pyre, then another. Someone cried out; beside her, she felt Vanyel go rigid again.

Dara hesitated, and then put her arm around his shoulders. _:Hey. It’s all right: _

Within seconds, the entire pyre was in flames. Sparks flew into the sky, crackling, vibrant orange-on-blue. Dara couldn’t hear the song anymore, the voices were drowned out; she could hear laughter all around her, shouts, words that drifted past her ears.

Vanyel’s mood must have been catching. Suddenly, Dara wasn’t feeling especially joyous either.

_:What are you thinking about?: _she sent.

_:You really want to know?: _

_:Yes. I do: _

_:Urtho, I guess: _He lifted his hand, gestured at the flames; the firelight cast his cheekbones in relief. _:How every year, they sing tribute to him. And it’s not enough, it doesn’t mean a thing – he’s still dead. And everyone who knew him, and their children, and their children’s children… Two thousand years of people dying. And it keeps happening. Every. Goddamned. Year: _

There was pain leaking through in his mindvoice, but he had it well under control, and Dara had been there in the Work Room. She could handle it.

_:It’s not a big enough fire, you know?: _He let his head fall against her shoulder. _:Not for one death. Much less all of them. You couldn’t make a funeral pyre big enough to do it justice, not with all the wood in the world: _

Oddly, Dara knew what he meant.

Vanyel’s mindvoice was a whisper on the roaring wind, the air hot and dry on their faces. _:Makes you understand. Why Leareth wants something to change. I can’t agree with his methods, but…he sees the tragedy of it: _

Dara felt it ripple through her. _:Oh: _Her eyes were burning, her chest a tight knot. _:Vanyel, it’s okay if you need to cry now: _She took a shuddering breath. _:Because I’ll feel better about crying if it’s both of us and my friends think it’s a Herald thing and not just me:_

* * *

“It’s always inspiring, watching this with you,” Randale said to Karis, gesturing at the crowds that lined either side of the street. “This city is very loyal to you."

He didn’t need to raise his voice for her to hear him, because no one was shouting to them; as the walked, torches and candles and lanterns were raised in silence.

“It is an honour and a privilege,” Karis said quietly.

Raised eyebrows. “One that still surprises you.” 

“Perhaps.” Was that true? She felt something odd, looking out at those packed streets. Her people.

“I feel the same. Every time I walk into a Council meeting, and every single of one of them stands. I have a feeling they’re not seeing _me_. Not a sick old man.”

“You are hardly old.” Randi was only thirty-one, the same age that she was – still plenty young enough for more children, and a couple of her senior advisors had been hounding her that the general policy _was _‘an heir and a spare.’ Karis nodded and smiled and said of course she hoped it would happen, if it were the will of Vkandis, and kept to herself that she had no intention of going through any part of that experience again.

“Maybe not, but I am mortal.” His voice was strange, distant. “And fallible. Karis, I’ve handled this last six months so far from perfectly. Every day I wonder if I’m going to be good enough for what’s coming.”

“It is a difficult thing.” Karis could have tried to offer words of comfort, but all of them would be lies, and she had never lied to Randi. _A foundation of trust_, he had said. If the citizens of their two kingdoms didn’t, quite, trust one another, at least their two monarchs ought to; it was the very least she could do for her people.

It had been the will of Vkandis that they would be allies – she had felt it in her bones from the very beginning, the day her father died and she fled the Palace, and the night they had taken back Sunhame had been all the confirmation she could ever need.

Her Sunlord must have known about Leareth, even then. _I wish that I knew what He wanted of His daughter. _

There had been no signs this time. She had only her own conscience to guide her – but, as Sola pointed out over and over, she was His daughter, and if He had offered no portents or omens, it was because He thought her judgement would be enough.

She had to believe that, or else…what?

Something that she wouldn’t, couldn’t, think about yet.

Sola approved of Vanyel’s current journey, there was that. _Always sensible to gather more information if you can, before a decision, _she had said.

In fact, Sola approved of Vanyel in general.

–As though thinking of her had summoned her, which maybe it had, the Suncat leapt down lightly into her lap from the raised back of the chair. How she had gotten up there in the first place, Karis didn’t know.

_:You know: _Sola sent, _:not everything I think is a direct revelation from Vkandis. I have a mind of my own: _

Next to her, Randi reached out a hand to stroke the Suncat’s fur. Sola butted her oversized head up against his forearm, purring.

_:I like him: _Sola sent. _:For the same reasons you get along. He’s brave and loyal and curious and stubborn and kind: _She curled her tail up, brushing Karis’ cheek. _:He’s not infallible, and maybe he has misread the situation entirely – but if so, it’s not for lack of trying: _

“He does not approve of the gods,” Karis murmured out loud. He hadn’t said so out loud, quite, but she was hardly blind.

_:Can’t blame the man for that. They’ve not given him an easy time of it: _

Yet again, Karis had the sense that there was a piece she was missing, a part of the story that made up Vanyel’s life. People usually made sense to her. He never had.

Sola did nothing to enlighten her.

“What do you think he will do?” she whispered.

_:Honestly? I have no idea: _Sola settled herself in Karis’ lap, and started washing one paw. _:Probably something that would never have occurred to either of us: _

Karis closed her eyes, and left her second question unvoiced. _What should I do? _

Randi had asked her about troops, and mages. She had no great supply of either, but she would offer him everything she could. She could grant him her mind, her opinions, any ideas that she might have that would give him more options.

And if she was missing some enormous, crucial considerations, she really hoped that her Sunlord would let her know.

* * *

It had to be nearly midnight, but to his own surprise, Vanyel wasn’t particularly tired. Maybe it was the music, a complex weave of drumbeats and horns, with a flute dancing in and out. Maybe it was the blaze of fire; even a hundred yards off, he felt the heat of it on his skin. Maybe it was all the people around him, dancing, chanting, laughing. Usually the crush of bodies around him would have felt suffocating, but somehow right now it seemed appropriate. There was a camaraderie to it, even amongst strangers.

Dara was certainly enjoying herself. She danced next to him, head thrown back, and every once in a while she would grab his hand and spin him around. Right now, she was dancing face to face with a young man, each of them mirroring the other’s movements. Not like any kind of partner-dance Vanyel had ever seen in Valdemar, but it had its own beauty.

Vanyel, unsure how the rules of this dance worked, had Mindtouched Dara for clarification, and her laughter in his head had made his cheeks flame, but she had explained what she had picked up.

One of Dara’s friends from Jor’ethan had offered him a drink, passing around an oversized wooden cup, and he thought it might have contained something other than wine. He was more than tipsy; everything felt warm and soft and light, almost floating. It was oddly like Melody’s Gift, in fact. The music seemed to beat out a pattern on his bones, limbs tugged to move with the beat.

Distantly, he became aware of a figure dancing next to him. He turned.

The young man was laughing, hands lifted in invitation. His jet-black hair was braided tightly to his head, a long cord of it hanging down his back, his eyes dark and flashing. They moved from Vanyel’s face down his body, then back – a familiar, appraising, appreciative glance – and he smiled sunnily.

Vanyel blinked. He might not be the most perceptive when it came to flirting, but the other man’s attraction was extremely obvious. Gods, he hadn’t even thought to wonder how the Shin’a’in felt about someone being _shaych. _

–If they were anything like the Tayledras, they would have no issues with it at all.

_:Come on, you: _Yfandes sent, chuckling in the back of his mind. _:Go for it: _

_Might as well. _It was Midsummer, an excellent excuse for a night off; if he wasn’t viewing memories, he might as well do something fun. Vanyel returned the smile, and lifted his own hands.

It was challenging, matching the rhythm of the other man’s movements, then thinking of new dance-moves to introduce – it was engrossing, in fact, blocking out all other thought.

They moved closer, bit by bit.

Vanyel wasn’t sure which of them reached out first – it seemed to happen as a single motion, and then their hands were clasped together, faces only inches apart. He could feel the other man’s body heat against his skin. He was distantly aware that he ought to feel self-conscious about it, or something, but it was hard to remember what the point of that was.

_:Hey, relax: _Yfandes sent, with a playful poke.

–The kiss happened suddenly, but it felt natural. Right. They moved to the rhythm of the music, the other man clasping his body… _I don’t even know his name, _Vanyel thought vaguely.

Any other time, that would have mattered rather a lot, but he couldn’t bring himself to mind.

* * *

Stef sat on the lip of the slate roof, legs dangling over the edge, and watched the crowds far below.

He probably _shouldn’t _have been climbing around on the roof of the Palace in Sunhame, even if arguable it counted as practice for his lessons with Katha. She had been pleased that he was already good at climbing and running along roofs – his short stature and slight weight helped, there, he could still shimmy up most drain-pipes. He could cross from one side to the other of the Exile’s Gate district in Haven without ever touching the ground. This climb had been easy in comparison – solid stone, not rickety thatch roofs, and plenty of crenellations to use as foot-holds.

Jisa had invited him to join her and her mother on the Solstice procession through the streets of Sunhame. Stef had declined. It had been a very long day, he was tired, and he found that he didn’t particularly want to celebrate right now.

Below him, a thousand lights, torches and lanterns and candles, snaking through the city.

Above, the stars.

He was on the outside, looking in. It suited his mood; lately Stef had often felt that way. He had gotten very good at sitting in the corners of rooms and making himself invisible, using the same Empathic effect he had once used to hide from a room of Thoughtsensers, nudging the petitioners and Guild representatives and visiting minor nobles who lined up at Randi’s audiences into forgetting he was there.

It meant he got to hear all sorts of things, now that he was better at letting his Gift run without it taking up all of his attention, but it was surprisingly lonely. 

Stef pulled one knee in to his chest, letting the other swing, and tossed a broken-off piece of slate down into the gardens below. Odd how being up here, with the city spread out below him and only air above, made him feel like he could think more clearly. Like he could step back from his life and wonder at everything that had happened in the last five years.

He had a place. A future. Allies and friends.

Once that would have been enough, so much more than enough, unimaginable to his ten-year-old self. Why didn’t it feel sufficient anymore?

Something was terribly wrong in his Kingdom.

Stef had sworn an oath to King Randale that he wouldn’t keep asking questions on his own, and so he hadn’t. But he couldn’t un-see it, and in the context of what he already knew, the cracks were obvious – in the significant glances, the unsaid words, awkward silences and changes of topic.

The stumbling, off-center feeling that sometimes there were two entirely different conversations happening in the same meeting.

Whatever it was, Karis knew, and she was frightened.

It wasn’t Stef’s responsibility to fix it. He _couldn’t_ fix it, because he didn’t have the context he needed, didn’t understand what was happening – oh, he hated that, it felt like trying to run on quicksand. He had only sat in on half of the King’s meetings today, the ones with Karis’ Council present. The rest had been private, and probably they had been discussing the things he wasn’t allowed to know.

_There is a threat to the Kingdom_, Randale had said, _and within the next few years we might well find ourselves at war. _

Stef hadn’t ever spoken of it with Jisa again. It wasn’t like there was anything they could do, and somehow it had always felt too uncomfortable to bring up.

_The Heralds are united. _Only, Stef doubted that. _I’m not blind. _

_I can promise you, _Randale had said, solemn and earnest,_ the Kingdom in is in good hands._

If there was one thing Stef knew from his History lessons, it was that good people with good intentions weren’t always enough.

The King had acknowledged as much. _I can’t tell you that everything will be all right_. _It’s never in the hands of mere mortals, to guarantee that. _

Stef absolutely hated to admit it to himself, but it was easier, up here far away from the lights and sound and people. He was afraid.

A place at Court wouldn’t mean much in a Kingdom torn apart by war. A war they might _lose_, and then no amount of favour with the King would save him.

Not to mention, if there was another war, Herald Vanyel would have to fight. Maybe he would die. The songs glossed over that part, but he had heard Medren’s stories as well, and it had come awfully close a time or two–

One of his very first real conversations with his roommate was a lot more disturbing, now, knowing who his uncle was. _Our priest stabbed him. Thought he would die for sure. The Healer said it was a miracle–_

No. He wasn’t going to think about that right now.

Herald Vanyel had been gone for nearly three months, on some kind of secret mission that even Jisa and Medren knew nothing about – it was officially a ‘trade mission’ in Rethwellan, but that made no sense.

Stef knew it was completely ridiculous to worry about the safety of the most powerful Herald-Mage in Valdemar. He worried anyway.

_Admit it, you miss talking to him. _In their few conversations, it had amazed him that Vanyel was apparently interested in what he had to say, even when he felt incredibly tongue-tied and the farthest thing from witty.

For a few minutes, Stef sat and entertained a quiet fantasy about Vanyel coming back to Haven. And being happy to see him. _Very _happy.

And yet, somehow the sky made it feel petty. There were bigger things to worry about. A dying King. A too-young heir who wouldn’t be in Whites for years. A nebulous threat, and whatever it was, Stef was more and more certain it was _worse _than merely another war.

It was always good to be a Bard in interesting times. Times when history was being made. Stef hadn’t considered the corollary – that the best ballads all came from times of real danger. Danger that Valdemar had come through, but that had never been guaranteed at the time. Kingdoms could and did fall.

He was already helping, Stef reminded himself, giving the King precious candlemarks when he was clear-headed. That mattered. 

_I could be doing more. _

…It was an alien thought for him. Stef folded his arms, almost self-conscious. _Obviously I care about the fate of the Kingdom. I happen to live in it. _He wasn’t sure why he felt defensive about it, or who he was defending himself to. The imaginary version of Medren who lived in his head, maybe.

Or Jisa. _Stef, I don’t like it when people lie to themselves. Who are you trying to convince that you’re completely self-interested?_

Jisa could go jump in a lake, and take her goddamned mind-reading Gifts with her.

* * *

It was nearly noon, and Dara sat at the mouth of their tent, taking advantage of the shade, and fanning herself with one of Vanyel’s books. He hadn’t come back all night – when she wandered back, alone, in the early hours of the morning, she had been able to keep warm by stealing his blankets as well as hers, but the heat of the day was harder to avoid. _I’ve gotten spoiled. _She was so used to his weather-barriers.

Dara was feeling quite relaxed, and far too hot and sticky to move. She didn’t see Vanyel coming until he was almost back to the tent. He looked quite amusingly disheveled, she thought, barefoot with his shirt off and draped over his arm, boots in his hand. He had clearly just dunked his head in one of the water-troughs, and his hair was a sopping tangle.

He was smiling, and humming to himself.

“Had a good night?” she said, grinning.

Vanyel froze. “Oh. Morning, Dara. Didn’t see you there.”

She raised her eyebrows. “I repeat the question.”

Vanyel made a face at her. His cheeks were already turning pink. “Not your business,” he said tightly.

“Aw, come on. I saw you getting friendly with…what’s-his-name? Good catch, by the way, he’s gorgeous.” Dara had been a little jealous. She had kissed one of the boys from Jor’ethan for a bit, but she hadn’t been interested in taking it further with him in particular – he was too young.

_:He was your age: _Rolan sent, amused.

_:Yes, well, maybe I’ve gotten a taste for older men: _Girls matured faster than boys, that was a well-known fact – sixteen-year-old boys were _awful_.

“Ketra’ven,” Vanyel said, forcedly. His face was brick-red now.

“And did you and Ketra’ven enjoy each other’s company?” she pressed.

“Dara, _please_.”

Teasing him was too much fun. “Oh, all right. Fine. Be a prude about it. I’m just glad you had some fun for once.”

“I was drunk,” Vanyel protested, slipping past her into the tent. “I don’t normally do that.”

“You should get drunk more often, then.” Dara sighed a little with relief as Vanyel raised his hands to lay a reverse weather-barrier, and she felt the air start to cool. “Are you going to see him again?” she said, nobly resisting the urge to leer.

“…Maybe. If I’m not too busy.”

“Don’t you dare waste that opportunity.” Dara groaned. “Come on. I bet Yfandes is telling you to go for it.”

Vanyel grimaced, which meant that was _exactly _what Yfandes was telling him. Dara hid her smirk behind her hand.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’m currently working full-time on an original fantasy novel about rationality, effective altruism, artificial intelligence and existential risk. (Honestly, many similar themes to this fic, but more densely crammed in and minus the interludes of Vanyel Has Feelings.) 
> 
> Over the past couple years of writing this fanfic, I’ve often done drastic rewrites in response to criticism that made the story much better, as well as collecting inspiration for future sections. I’m particularly interested in feedback from readers who don’t know as much about rationality or EA, so that I can make sure I’m not skipping any explanations. If you haven’t been a beta reader before and aren’t sure how to offer useful constructive criticism, I usually have prompts and specific questions. I’m also interested in input from slower readers: since I’m a fast reader and a fast writer, I think I have a tendency to use more words than strictly necessary, and it’s valuable to be called on that. 
> 
> How I envision this looking: if you sign up, I would send you a block of material, probably 10-20K words at a time, in a format of your choice (google doc, ebook, etc). You would set aside time within 1 week to convey your feedback; you can do this via google doc comments, an email writeup, filling out a template of prompts, or real-time discussion over text chat or a call. The requested time commitment is however long it takes you to read a given block of material, plus at least 30 minutes per section conveying feedback, ideally consistently over a period of months. You don’t necessarily need to commit to being involved for the entire project, if you’re not sure what your future availability will be, and if you aren’t sure the turnaround time will work for you but are still interested, let me know anyway and I can add you to the list for second-draft reading. You also don’t need to continue as a beta reader if you end up hating the story, though it would be valuable for me to hear what isn’t working for you about it. 
> 
> If you’re interested in being involved, you can fill out this form: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSeCsazMhG8W6W76J__dwOcgoQCRgzzjtopl13ggQ2vvT6g0UA/viewform


	16. Chapter Sixteen

Kata’shin’a’in was even more beautiful at the end of summer, Vanyel though, in a haunting sort of way. Landmarks were vanishing one by one; Jor’ethan’s giant bear had been gone for a week already, and For’ahier was half dismantled. A slow exodus, like leaves blowing away in the wind. Yesterday had been the last day the bazaar was open.

The afternoons were still hot, but the air smelled different; the wind had changed, coming in from the west now.

In the end, Vanyel had watched the entire archive with Karna, every single record from Ravenwing’s lifetime. They had finally finished two weeks ago; it had gone slower because he had been trying to take off one day in three, but they hadn’t been in much of a rush at that point, given that they were waiting anyway.

After that, he had gone back to see some of the most important-seeming tapestries ones again. The Goddess-manifestation, Ravenwing’s meetings with Urtho, a few others. They had been a lot easier to handle the second time, maybe because he knew what to expect.

He hadn’t found a lot of time to see Ketra’ven again, but they had crossed paths a few times. They didn’t actually have much to talk about. Ketra’ven was friendly, though, even if he did turn into one of the more boring and even irritating people Vanyel had met whenever he opened his mouth – there had been plenty of activities that didn’t involve talking, at least.

Three and a half months that they had been gone. In Valdemar, the crops would be ripening in the fields now. Most likely the treaty with the north had been signed months ago, and the volunteer party of Heralds and Healers would have gone north, probably accompanied by a few intrepid Bards as well. Savil would be helping Kilchas and Sandra to juggle what was surely an increased burden of Web-alarms. Joshel would be working on setting the harvest-taxes. Lissa would be meeting with Keiran about troop placements. Maybe Shavri had figured out how to imitate Trainee Stefen’s Gift by now. _I wonder how the lad’s doing? _Shavri had mentioned to him before he left that the young Bardic student had been pushing himself too hard around the spring festival, and that Katha was going to cut down his lessons – Katha, who was going to have a child. What an odd yet warming thought.

Vanyel kept finding himself dwelling on Stef – and worrying. _We need him so badly. _They couldn’t afford to burn him out, and it was unfair to the boy besides. He had considered dropping by to check on him after the spring festival incident, before their departure, but had settled for asking Medren to look after his roommate. Medren had given him an odd look, but smiled and agreed.

Three and a half months. _Gods, I hope this is worth it. _Vanyel had a saddlebag’s worth of notes, a head full of memories that weren’t his, and no especially coherent conclusions.

Yfandes drifted up to his side, the lavender dawn highlighting her coat. _:Chosen, love, it doesn’t exactly paint him in a good light: _

No. Even taken with a very large grain of salt, the facts they had learned were that Ma’ar had been the aggressor, waging a ruthless, brutal war against a Kingdom that had posed no threat to him. One that had been peaceful and prosperous for seventy years before – the duration since Urtho had built his Tower.

_:So he can be a cold bastard: _he sent. _:Hellfires, ‘Fandes, so can I: _Not the life he would have chosen, not the person he had wished to be, ever, but the consequences were the same. _:And we knew that about him already: _

_:Van, isn’t it telling that his first act was a power grab?: _She nudged at his shoulder, and he absently laid a hand on her neck. _:He told us once that he had tried every other way, but it really doesn’t look like it: _

A point. Vanyel ran his fingers through Yfandes’ mane, catching on a braid that was still there from their last visit to Pretera’sedrin camp. He watched the young men and woman across the path, taking down and folding away a large domed tent.

_:Maybe it was a mistake: _he sent. _:He admitted that his past decisions weren’t always wise. Maybe he was just young, and reckless, and arrogant, and he thought fixing the world would be as simple as taking over and running things better: _

_:Or maybe that’s never been his true goal at all: _Yfandes shot back. _:Maybe all he really wanted was power, and he learned later to put a better spin on it: _

_:We don’t know anything about his motivations for the war: _he reminded her. _:What we do know might as well be propaganda against him, given how it ended. I mean, gods, we know so little about Tantara, and most of it from the perspective of the privileged. Maybe it was all kinds of awful for the common folk, and Ma’ar was just trying to do something about that: _

Her mindvoice was acid. _:You’re still trying to defend him?: _

Vanyel closed his eyes. _:I don’t know. ‘Fandes, I don’t know what to think anymore. I’m confused, and – yes, maybe I don’t want to admit that he isn’t who I thought. This is information, and it does point in one direction, and if I were Randi, I guess I would understand why he would consider this enough to rule out an alliance. Just… I don’t think we can be sure: _

_:I don’t think we can ever be sure, Chosen, but at some point we’re going to have to say that we know enough to make a decision: _

He leaned against her. _:I know. If I had to decide one way or another, right now… I would fight him, I guess. But we don’t have to make a decision, yet. I don’t think we should, or it’ll, I don’t know, close off options. Make us forget to be curious: _

It was an ‘us’ that he used without thinking, and his thoughts stumbled on it. _Are you really with me, Yfandes? _

He hadn’t meant her to overhear that thought, but of course she did. _:Of course, Chosen. No matter what, until the end: _

It was a promise that Vanyel wasn’t sure she could make, but he didn’t argue with her. _I need you. I need to believe that you’ll stay. _

Even if it meant believing something false?

He wasn’t sure. He didn’t know how to think about it anymore.

* * *

Pretera’sedrin Camp was slowly coming apart – the tower had been dismantled days ago, and the beehive-like structure of auxiliary Healers’ tents was half gone. The people were resting in the remaining shade; even a month past Midsummer, the afternoons were too hot for any kind of physical labour.

Dara stood in the quiet dimness of An’dora’s central Healing tent, feeling the sweat cool on her skin.

“You are departing?” the Healer said, without looking up from where her hands moved busily, grinding something with a mortar and pestle on one of her long trestle-tables.

“We leave tomorrow at dawn,” Dara said. “I came to say thank you. For everything you’ve done for us.”

An’dora did turn, this time, flashing her a quick smile. “You are very welcome, Dara of Valdemar. I would thank you as well. You are a good and loyal friend.”

Warmth bloomed in Dara’s stomach. “You think so?”

“I do.” Narrowed eyes. “Why else are you here?”

Dara hesitated, and then swung the satchel down from her shoulder and set it on the table, where it clinked loudly as it settled. “The herb that you’ve been giving Vanyel. How much to buy _all _of it?”

The Healer’s eyebrows rose into her hair.

“We, um, have a long journey ahead of us,” Dara added quickly, “and I really don’t want to run out.” An’dora didn’t know that they were going to Urtho’s Tower; without actually lying, Dara had tried to give her the impression that they were leaving the Plains.

Vanyel said they weren’t likely to be at the Tower more than a month, but Dara wondered if that was wishful thinking because he wanted to go home. It wasn’t like they had originally been expecting to stay in Kata’shin’a’in for the nearly two months that they had. Probably it was better to leave a lot of margin for error, and maybe not rely on Vanyel’s estimates anymore.

An’dora was silent for a moment. “I will not sell you all of my stock,” she said. “I may need it for others. It is the end of trading season, and I will not be able to send anybody east for more until spring.”

East. “Where do you buy it?” Dara said hopefully. Maybe _she _could go there on her own, after they were done seeing what was left of the Tower.

A tilt of her dark head. “Seejay.”

Much too far to travel right now, Dara thought, and it would be hard to justify detouring there on the way back. “Well, I’ll buy whatever you can spare – I’ll pay double for it – and if you tell me what it’s called and give me some hints, I can go there myself later.”

“Hmm.” And then, to her surprise, the Healer smiled broadly. “I am not so heartless as to charge you double. In fact, I will give it to you at half the usual price. I can perhaps spare four months’ worse, at the dose that your friend needs, though I am afraid you will need to measure it yourself. It will cost you fifteen gold.”

Dara nodded along. An’dora had been packaging it in tiny bags of fine gauze mesh, that could be dumped into a cup of boiling water and left to steep, and Dara had been picking up a week’s worth at a time . “If you show me how,” she said. “And, um…”

“Spit it out, girl,” An’dora said.

“Do you have any seeds to grow it?” Dara hadn’t been sure if that would be too much to ask and thus offensive. “I know it might not normally grow as far north as Valdemar, if the climate is different, but they have a hothouse at Healers’, and they’re very good at keeping exotic plants alive. I’d never even heard of this herb existing, else I’m sure the Healers would’ve sent someone south to buy it already.”

Silence.

“That,” An’dora said slowly, “will demand a much higher price.”

“You do have seeds!” Dara resisted the urge to clap her hands with sheer glee. “I knew it! All right, how much? I, um, if it’s going to be more than twenty gold I maybe can’t afford that…” Though she would certainly tell someone at the House of Healing as soon as they got back, and maybe _they _could send someone to Seejay.

“Twenty gold! I am not sure what you must think of me, girl. I am a Healer, not a disreputable stall-vendor._” _An’dora wasn’t really offended, though; her eyes were twinkling, and a moment later they took on a calculating look. “Another fifteen gold, for seeds.”

That was still a _lot_. Enough to feed and house them for two weeks in Jkatha. “How many seeds?” Dara said, wishing she had kept her mouth shut and not hinted to An’dora at how desperate she was. “And how old are they? I don’t want to pay fifteen gold for seeds that might not grow anymore–”

“You truly must think me an unscrupulous monster.” An’dora sighed. “I have already given half of those seeds I purchased to the shaman here in Kata’shin’a’in, in hopes that it might grow here. They sprouted well, but it seems it is too dry for the plant to flourish, and so I kept the remaining seeds in hopes that I might sell them elsewhere. It is a bag so large–” she held out her hands, “–about thirty seeds. If your Healers are as skilled as you say, it ought to be plenty.”

“Yes, of course.” Dara chewed her lip. “Um, you probably do have to tell me what part of the plant they need to use and how to prepare it, I don’t want them to have to guess…”

An’dora only laughed. “Of course. I will not even charge you extra for that advice.”

Dara was so relieved that she felt giddy. “I’m starting to doubt you’re a real Shin’a’in, you aren’t haggling with me at _all_.”

“I am a Healer! Not a mere trader.” An’dora reached out and took her arm. “Come here. I will show you.”

Half a candlemark later, Dara was making her back to their tent, humming to herself and practically skipping, carrying a very well-wrapped package the size of her head, and with a small leather envelope of precious seeds tucked into her tunic. She had a travel-Healers’ kit as well, with painkillers and other herbs neatly packaged in cloth bags with tiny drawstrings, mostly at An’dora’s suggestion; it had cost her another ten gold, and she was starting to wonder if the Healer was a good bargainer after all. It never _felt _like it, while they were talking, but her coin-satchel was considerably lighter.

Maybe a good thing – Rolan hardly needed more weight to carry around on a long journey.

She wasn’t going to tell Vanyel she had spent thirty gold _daari _on him. It wouldn’t even be hard to keep it from him, he probably wouldn’t ask – Dara was increasingly of the impression that he had very little experience of having to pay for things. He was _terrible _at haggling.

Well, not everyone could be good at everything. It still made Dara feel a bit smug.

* * *

“I think we have a bandit problem,” Savil said, standing in the doorway.

Sandra didn’t even look up from her table. “That’s hardly anything new.”

“Well, how many times have you dealt with Web-alarms on the North Trade Road this week?”

This time, Sandra did at least lift her head. “Three. Two on the road itself, one in a village. Didn’t seem like a lot.”

“I handled five. Do you know about Kilchas…?”

“What about me?” The bedroom door opened, and Kilchas wandered out, yawning, his stringy hair a mess.

_Living together now, are you? _Sandra hadn’t said anything about it, but she wouldn’t have, and it wasn’t really Savil’s business to ask. _I’m just glad they’re happy. _They were trying to be discreet, but even Savil could see the way they looked at each other in public.

“Web-alarms in the north,” Savil said shortly. “Bandit attacks on the North Trade Road, the section of it’s that not paved yet, I mean–” really, past the final Guard-post at the Border, it was barely a road to speak of, more of a trail that could fit a horse, but often not a carriage, “–or villages near it. Especially in the area around, what’s it called, Sweet Grass Valley.”

Kilchas knuckled at his eyes. “Four, for me. Why?”

“Because that makes twelve raids in a week. I hadn’t noticed the pattern until now, but I forgot the two of you were handling alarms as well.”

“That does seem like a lot.” Sandra had turned around now, interest coming into her face. “What are you thinking?”

“That we have a more serious problem than I thought. People don’t travel up there unarmed, and they’re used to defending themselves on their own, even the tiny villages have militias. If the Web is calling us in, it’s because the bandits are well-organized enough to overcome that resistance.” She hesitated. “How many of yours had mages?”

“None,” Sandra said quickly.

“One, for me.”

“And one for me as well. Two the week before – and I killed one of them.” Savil sighed. “We need to bring this to Keiran, and I think we need a plan of attack.”

“Is it really our highest–”

“Sandra.” Savil spoke quietly, but firmly. “We owe these people protection. They’re Valdemaran citizens now.”

“Which is a goddamned headache,” Kilchas said cheerfully, “but what can we do? Happy to help you plan, Savil.”

“We’ll have to pull in the other Herald-Mages who are up there,” Savil said. “This calls for someone on site, and Randi isn’t going to send any of us.”

That still felt wrong to her – surely the most powerful mages should have been in the dangerous circuits, not the weakest – but it was true that her joints made her regret it when she rode long days or camped outside, Kilchas still couldn’t walk without the aid of a cane, and Sandra was, well, emotionally unsuited to life on circuit. The Herald-Mages up north were all young and spry, which did a great deal to make up for weaker Gifts, and all of them had at least moderate Mindspeech as well.

If Vanyel were here, he would be able to work via Heralds with strong Mindspeech and the mage-gift in potential. Savil, despite many attempts, had never mastered that technique except at short range, where ‘short range’ meant ‘in the same room’ and was thus pretty much useless. Her Mindspeech range wasn’t nearly as good as Vanyel’s, she had much less power to throw into the Web, and she was less intimately familiar with it even now.

They would need Farsight coverage as well, Savil thought – and it was damned irritating that right now, except for Vanyel, they had no one who was both a strong Mindspeaker and a strong Farseer. She had better speak to Tran, see what their options were for Heralds to send on-site.

“I’ll spend some time in the Web poking around,” she offered. “If they do have a mage with them, especially if they’re using blood-power, that ought to show up.”

“I can help,” Sandra offered. “You take the east of the road, I’ll take the west?”

Savil nodded, grateful. Sandra wasn’t as good at offensive work through the Web as Kilchas, but she was much better at pure observation. “Thank you.”

Kilchas was puttering around, heating water for tea. “Hey, Savil. How are things with that dreadful student of yours?”

“Arkady? He’s not dreadful. He’s had a bad time of it, that’s all.” She shook his head. “Progressing slowly.” It was hard to believe he had been training with her for nearly three months. “He can handle a basic barrier-shield now. He’s seeing the new Mindhealer who took over from Melody, what’s-his-name.”

The boy still seemed to hate and fear most of the Heralds – she had watched him flinch every time he passed a figure in white – but he seemed to be slowly opening up to _her_, at least. Maybe it helped that she had stopped wearing Whites to their lessons after the first day, and came in Tayledras robes instead.

A hopeful thought. _I could fob him off on Starwind and Moondance – _No, she wasn’t going to ask that much of them. Not when they might need all the favours they could call on later, for something a lot bigger.

“Hmm,” Kilchas muttered. “Still think he’s a waste of time, but how about the books you traded for? Any progress there?”

It had been extremely hard to make time for it. “A little,” she said, optimistically. “One of them definitely mentions Gates.” And contained a diagram of what she was very hopeful was a permanent Gate-threshold. If only she could figure out what any of the labels on the sketch meant. Natti didn’t know.

The elderly woman was doing well for herself here, at least; she had landed a position as governess to Lord Lathan’s heir and his small children. Apparently, unlike his father, the younger Lathan was actually decent man. _I hope old Lord Lathan has the grace to die at a reasonable age– _Savil quickly shoved the very uncharitable thought away.

“And our other mages?” Kilchas added. “Sandra told me she had two of them over to work on shield-talismans together.”

“Oh. Very good.” Savil had asked Sandra and Lissa to arrange that, at some point, and then entirely forgotten about it. “How did it go?”

“They do shoddy work,” Sandra complained. “Not up to any reasonable standard. And they’re a bit set in their ways, but I suppose they’re trainable. Eventually.” 

“I’m still meaning to go over there and drill them on synchronized attacks,” Kilchas added. “Are they ready for it yet?”

“Not particularly,” Savil admitted. “None of them are Mindspeakers,” it was odd, the Gift almost always co-occurred with mage-gift here in Valdemar, and among the Tayledras, but it seemed rarer elsewhere, “and they’ve never done any kind of concert-work.”

They were just as delighted as Dakar had been about learning to build tiny Gates, at least, and the two who had specialized in weather-magic, and thus had the best control, had mastered it well enough to Gate across Haven. None were strong enough to Gate further alone, unfortunately, and she hadn’t gotten them to the point that they could energy-share for it.

If she was honest with herself, it still felt like the borrowed mages were more trouble than they were worth. Even the weather-workers used a very different style, that made it hard for her to coordinate with them. The woman who specialized in laying permanent shields had proved her worth, at least; Savil didn’t trust her with anything in the Palace itself, her work was rougher than the usual Heraldic standards as well, but at least she could take on the incessant requests from various lords and minor nobles.

“I was wondering,” Kilchas said. “If we ought to think about founding a Collegium for mages.”

“What?” Savil blinked at him. “Why?”

Sandra answered. “I remembered something I read once. Rethwellan has a lot of mages, because their schools of mage-craft are well known, and people will travel in just for that. And then sometimes they settle down once they graduate.”

Oh. That had never occurred to her before. “Interesting,” Savil acknowledged. “Tricky given the _vrondi_…” The talismans still took about twenty candlemarks of Sandra’s time to make; Savil let Arkady keep his all on the time, she didn’t have the heart to deny him that and it gave her a way to keep an eye on him at a distance, but the other eight were still sharing three amongst themselves.

“We could make building one of the talismans a test,” Kilchas suggested helpfully. “To move up and get the title of Master. That’s sort of like what they did in Baires with the Mavelans’ school, from what I’ve heard.” 

“Mmm.” She could see why Kilchas had brought it up – it was a good idea, in principle – but it felt impossible in practice. _We’ll never get the Council to approve it. _Foreign mages, with no ties to Valdemar, training in the capital itself… And it wasn’t like they had a lot of teachers to spare.

* * *

_:Oh: _Dara sent, rising in her stirrups, and her mindvoice was strange.

They were moving across the wide-open Plains at a canter – an easy pace for their Companions, but the fastest that Karna shena Tale'sedrin and the young shaman of Liha'irden traveling with them could manage sustainably. They were a day out, and Kata’shin’a’in had shrunk to a blurred line on the horizon, then a dot, then nothing. A surprisingly cool, refreshing wind whipped at Vanyel’s hair, and it smelled wrong, like dank marshes and rotting wood. It was blowing in from the northwest, today – from the Pelagirs.

The thigh of his once-broken leg was aching, even though it wasn’t that rough a ride. _I’m too old for this. _

_:What?: _he sent.

_:Nothing: _She had settled back into Rolan’s saddle. _:It felt exactly like the dream, for a moment: _

_:Seems like a sign that we’re on the right track: _Vanyel trusted the shaman, but he didn’t think they could ever have found their way on their own – there were no landmarks, only flat, gently creased plains of endless standing grass, with the occasional trickling stream or oasis-spring bearing a cluster of wind-stunted trees.

Vanyel shoved a lock of hair out of his eyes for what felt like the thousandth time. _I understand why all the Shin’a’in wear braids. _It was going to take him half a candlemark to undo all the snarls tonight.

_:Copper for your thoughts?: _Dara sent.

Vanyel made a face. _:That’s a poor deal. I’m going in circles, mostly: _The repetitive motion of riding, and the sameness of their surroundings, seemed to have been putting him into a sort of trance-state; he found his thoughts drifting in fragments, never finding purchase. _:I’m thinking about the Shin’a’in, I guess. And the Tayledras. The bargain they made: _Moondance had spoken of their pact with the Goddess, and yet Vanyel had never imagined it had been a literal negotiation and contract. Maybe it had been; maybe the ancient ancestors of k’Treva had seen their own manifestation of the Goddess. The Tayledras didn’t keep a written history of their own in the same way the Shin’a’in did.

_:What about it?: _Dara sent. She shivered in the saddle. _:It makes me uneasy for some reason: _

_:They gave up a portion of their free will: _Vanyel squinted, flinging an arm over his face, shielding against a gust of wind that raised dust and bits of dried hay. _:It’s not just a choice – I think there is something like a very mild geas. And I get the sense there are direct consequences, if they disobey the Goddess’s precepts: _

_:You think the Goddess steps in and punishes rule breaking?: _Dara’s mindvoice was dubious. _:That’s an awful lot of involvement: _

_:Not the Star-Eyed herself, necessarily. I have something of a sense that the leshy’a Kal’enedral serve that role: _He frowned to himself. _:Ravenwing and the others didn’t just decide for themselves. They decided for all of their descendants, permanently: _

_:They might not have had descendants if they hadn’t taken the offer: _Dara pointed out. _:Besides, it seems they have quite good lives, out here: _

That was true, and so did the Tayledras, with their hertasi and hot springs. In some ways. _:It’s dangerous: _he reminded her. _:If outsiders try to make their way onto the plains – and they do – then people will give their lives to stop them: _

_:Being a Herald is dangerous too: _Dara’s mindvoice was thoughtful. _:And, I mean, it’s not really a choice either. They call it Choosing, but it’s the Companions making the choice, not us: _

_:I had noticed that: _And had his fair share of mixed feelings about it, over the years.

He could feel Yfandes’ response to that thought, tension rising; he was letting her ride along in his surface thoughts today, and most recent days.

_:I’m sorry: _he sent to her. _:I didn’t mean… ‘Fandes, you did give me a choice: _

_:Sixteen years too late: _Guilt layered over something else, that he couldn’t quite name. _:And only because I did something unforgivable to you: _

_:’Fandes, I forgave you months ago: _he reminded her, pulling the link in closer and sending a wash of affection.

He felt her gratitude, mixed with regret. She hadn’t entirely forgiven herself.

_:It’s sort of the same with Companions: _he sent. _:I mean, you didn’t ask to be created. To be made with rules built into your mind: _

Companions weren’t, really, free – Yfandes might be the only one who was, or at least closer to it. He wasn’t sure any Herald ever born had questioned the ethics of their existence; they were tied so deeply into the fabric of Valdemar, and what they accomplished was good.

And yet. He wasn’t sure how to feel about a god that would create that sort of being.

_:They might not have foreseen what happened between us: _Yfandes sent. He could feel her discomfort, how much it hurt for her to think about – but she _could _think about it. Her unease was very understandable. Human. Vanyel didn’t like to think about his weaknesses and limitations either.

_:You certainly don’t: _Yfandes’ mindvoice was warm, but there was annoyance lurking behind it, along with real worry. _:Chosen, I know you don’t like to admit it when you’re having a problem. But you were hiding how you were feeling from me, in Kata’shin’a’in: _

_:It really wasn’t that bad: _And it was humiliating, how much Yfandes and Dara both kept hounding him about it. _:I’ve felt worse than that a hundred times, ‘Fandes. Only thing to be done is wait it out. I’m not stupid. You know there was no chance I was actually going to hurt myself: _

He felt something like a mental smack, though it was light. _:No. I don’t know that, actually: _

The overtones told him exactly what she was thinking about. _:’Fandes, that was one time. And it was by accident: _

_:Your definition of ‘by accident’ is a little different from mine: _Her mindvoice was as sharp as broken glass. _:Chosen, I know it feels like this is normal, to you, but it really isn’t: _

He sighed, and stroked her neck. _:I’m sorry, ‘Fandes. It’s just… If I tell you anything, you start panicking, and Dara starts panicking, and then I have to deal with both of you hovering over my neck, on top of everything else, and it’s exhausting: _

_:…I can see that: _The odd thing was, he thought she really did understand. _:I’m sorry. I’ll try to be better about it: _She sent a wave of love along their bond. _:You do seem better, this last month. I’m glad you saw the Healer: _

_:I’m glad as well: _It still felt like he couldn’t think quite as clearly, with the drug he was taking, but maybe that was an illusion; how much of the time was he already not thinking clearly because he was in pain, haunted by seventeen-year-old ghosts?

‘Lendel had been seventeen when he died… But even that thought was tolerable.

_:For one: _Yfandes sent, _:having this conversation doesn’t feel like picking my way through a field of mine-spells: _

A fair point. He hadn’t realized it, in the moment, but he didn’t feel particularly upset, only defensive. _Center and ground. _He tried to relax his shoulders.

_:I don’t want to fight about it: _he sent. _:’Fandes, I can understand why it’s scary for you…: _

Agreement. _:But it would be easier for you if I did better at keeping that piece to myself, instead of making you reassure me. I’ll try. Anyway, let’s not talk about this any more now: _

He smiled, stroking her mane, and they moved on in silence for a while.

_:Vanyel?: _Dara sent. _:You went quiet. Are you all right?: _

_:I’m fine: _He hoped that Mindspeech overtones would show it wasn’t a polite lie, this time.

_:I’m going to ask Vel’asha if we’re stopping soon: _Dara sent, a hint of discomfort and almost embarrassment leaking through.

_:What’s wrong?: _

_:Um, it’s just my time of month, actually, and it’s really annoying to get blood out of Whites: _

_:Oh: _Vanyel tried not to let his own feeling of awkwardness seep through; there wasn’t actually any reason to make Dara feel more embarrassed about it.

* * *

The Tower, or what was left of it, had been visible for half a day already, a vaguely cone-shaped mound of glassy, silvery rock, and it kept growing larger. And larger, and larger. It seemed to fill half the horizon, now, and in the slanting late-afternoon light, it cast a long and eerie shadow across the rippling golden grass.

It was strange, Dara thought, coming to a place that she had seen over and over in visions. There was a momentary confusion that kept coming over her, the sense that she wasn’t sure whether she was dreaming or awake.

Even destroyed, it was beautiful.

Vanyel had seen Urtho’s Tower from a distance when it was intact, through one of Ravenwing’s memories, and he had shared his memory of it with Dara. It had come through hazy, filtered through two people’s minds, but even so she had been awed.

Funny, how being there made it sink it. Ka'venusho had been a real place, and real people had lived there. Died there. Dara couldn’t imagine the force of destruction that could have melted and slagged that much stone. No one within a dozen miles could possibly have survived it, and, with the little she knew of military logistics, the rushed evacuation couldn’t possibly have gone so smoothly and been thorough enough that everyone except Urtho would have gotten out.

Eighteen hundred years ago – they had a much better sense of the timing thanks to the Shin’a’in record-keeping, accurate almost to the year – this had been the funeral pyre of one of the bravest people Dara had ever heard about.

Vanyel had been very quiet all morning. She wondered if that was what he was thinking about.

_:What do you think, Rolan?: _she sent.

_:It is very memorable: _A brief mental chuckle. _:I am not sure what we can learn. There seems to be little left: _

_:There must be a reason my Foresight sent us here: _Dara prodded. _:Maybe it’s because of the buried weapons?: _If there was something there that would give Vanyel what he needed to beat Leareth…

_:I would think it a very bad idea to try to dig them up: _Rolan’s mindvoice was steely. _:And I doubt the Shin’a’in would approve: _

There was a tiny cluster of tents near the base of the Tower-remains, Dara could see now, near a stand of trees that hinted at a well or spring. They were close.

_:Need?: _she sent, touching the sword’s hilt. _:What are you thinking of this?: _Need was a mage. Maybe there was something she could sense.

_:Very grand: _A tinge of sarcasm. _:No, girl, I can’t sense anything from here. Aside from the usual lack of mage-energy in this region:_

_:What do you mean?: _Dara sent, trying to remember if Vanyel had mentioned anything.

_:The energy-flows are minimal: _Need felt impatient, which wasn’t exactly a rare state for her. _:No nodes that deserve the name, and the leylines are sluggish:_

Huh. That didn’t bode well, if for some reason they ended up needing to fight – Dara didn’t know that much about mage-craft, but she knew that most of Vanyel’s offensive power came from his ability to use energy that didn’t come from his own reserves.

Of course, it would be breaking the Shin’a’in taboos to use magic here at all. Dara couldn’t think of any reason they would have to fight, not while they were being chaperoned by a shaman, who seemed perfectly comfortable riding about the Plains with such a small party and only the food their horses could carry, stopping to re-supply at the occasional oasis or nomadic camp.

It had been a fascinating journey. By the third day, the unrelenting monotony had been wearing on her, but then Dara had started to notice that the Plains weren’t featureless after all. There were quite a few landmarks, both natural – a glassy bowl-shaped depression, or a wind-eroded nub of rock – and artificial, piles of stones built up into shapes that she thought must have indicated direction. The shaman had offered no explanation of how she was navigating.

Dara was still having her monthly, which wasn’t the timing she would have chosen if it were up to her – she hadn’t come very prepared for it, her supplies from home had run out last month, and it made being in the saddle all day unpleasant – but at least the shaman was female as well, and had showed her how to collect cattail fluff from one of the tiny pools they had camped by and use it as absorbent stuffing. Her monthlies weren’t as bad as Kerrill’s; her roommate usually needed to miss a day of classes and stay in bed.

They had seen enormous herds of livestock, cattle and horses and sheep, roaming free with no kind of fences or paddocks, being driven along by what seemed like entirely inadequate numbers of young men and women on horseback. There were dogs as well, big friendly mastiffs who ran around the edges nipping at heels – and who were delighted to slobber all over the faces of anyone foolhardy enough to go near. Vanyel hadn’t enjoyed that experience at all.

Dara had thought about asking if there were any puppies, and if so whether she could take one home from her, but Rolan had pointed out, with amusement, that having a puppy to take care of would become tedious and time-consuming very quickly.

She had been woolgathering again – it was easy to slip into a half-trance, Rolan’s steady pace lulling her. Dara had fallen asleep in the saddle more than once, and endured Vanyel’s teasing, until _he _dozed off one afternoon and she had the opportunity to mock him for it in return.

Incredible, really, how comfortable she felt making fun of Herald-Mage Vanyel Demonsbane. It was hard to think of him that way when they had been traveling together nearly four months and she had seen him unshaven, shirtless, and half-awake in their shared tent on many a morning. They had held each other and cried, watching the Midsummer bonfire.

Hells, she had entirely stopped thinking about Randi and Tran’s doubts in him. It seemed silly.

It was probably a good thing he was shaych, or she would have been _sorely tempted _to try to seduce him, no matter how much Rolan disapproved.

* * *

Stef tugged the hood of his cloak further over his head, hiding his face in the shadows, and peeked around the corner of the alley before turning down it. He walked with a measured, tentative step, head down, trying to hide the fact that his entire body was thrumming with excitement.

He was a real spy, on a real spy-mission. After six months of lessons with her – they were back to their regular, awful morning start now that Katha was four months into her pregnancy and feeling better – she had judged he was ready.

It was an easy mission, of course, that wasn’t especially dangerous. He was in the Exile’s Gate district, but not the really _bad_ part of it, and if he got into trouble, he could use his Bardic Gift to talk his way out of it, and had Katha’s full permission to do so. If that didn’t work, there was a Herald not that far away, and he and Katha had worked on using his Bardic Gift to project a call for help in a fairly targeted way – he would still alert the nearby blocks that something was happening, which would mean he couldn’t complete his current errand, but he could at least avoid getting knifed, and try again later with a different disguise.

Right now, he had rather a lot of fireplace-soot mixed with lard combed into his hair and eyebrows, turning both to a dirty dark-brown colour. He wore shoes with thick soles that made him look an inch or two taller. It was impossible to make his shoulders much broader without the padding being obvious, but he was wearing very baggy clothes and a stuffed cushion strapped to his belly that gave him the appearance of a paunch. Even worse, he had a false moustache stuck to his upper lip, and he was supposed to squint as though he were nearsighted.

It was approximately the least attractive look that Stef could have conceived of, and the timid, squinty-eyed demeanour he was putting on didn’t help. Stef was used to turning heads among women and some fraction of men, and the complete absence of _any _interested looks on the entire walk here had been surprisingly galling. Katha, damn her, had thought it was hilarious, watching him glare at his hideous disguise in the mirror.

Oh well. It was in service of a real spy-mission, and afterwards he could go home, bathe, put on some nicer clothes, and go out to the tavern to have some fun.

He was supposed to do the rounds of the local pawnshops and road-stalls, introducing himself as Tafri, a tailor’s apprentice – which would seem an incredibly lucky opportunity, for most of the inhabitants of the area – who lived with his aunt in a decrepit room above one of the more dubious alehouses, having recently moved to Haven. The ‘aunt’ in question was actually a Herald, one of Katha’s agents, but she maintained a frequent presence in the area, as a gossipy washerwoman in one of the big laundry-houses, and really did sleep in the room on many nights.

Stef had an excuse to be there infrequently, given that his ‘apprenticeship’ was supposed to be in the east of the city, on the other side of the Palace. Like him, his persona had grown up in Three Rivers, which meant he could talk in some detail about that area in case anybody ever asked.

Probably they wouldn’t. Stef didn’t get the sense that curiosity flourished, here. It made him feel sad, and then he wanted to push that feeling away, because it was a distraction, and he wanted to be _enjoying _his first real night as a spy, even if he wasn’t doing anything more interesting than getting to know the area.

Jisa would have a lot of questions, and he wasn’t sure what he was going to tell her. The people who lived here had it _good_, compared to his own childhood – almost everyone had a roof to sleep under, a way to stay warm in winter, and if they weren’t exactly well-fed, at least they weren’t starving. He hadn’t seen many littles among the street-beggars.

True, that was because orphaned children in Haven tended to be snapped up by one of the various gangs, thieves and criminals, that Katha’s agent was constantly combating.

Jisa wasn’t going to think much of it. The child was so sheltered; she had no idea what many parts of Valdemar were like, and Stef was almost afraid to enlighten her. She was an unstoppable whirlwind, and he wasn’t sure what would happen to the world if those forces were ever really set loose.

* * *

They sat around the small campfire, warming their hands on the flames. It burned dried dung from the horses and cattle, because there was no wood here, and it was very smoky.

“I’ll try again in the morning,” Vanyel said quietly, “but I didn’t sense anything.” Not even the faintest trace of magic – but if there really were still functional weapons under all that mess, they were buried deep. Protected by far more than just Shin’a’in sentries on horseback with quivers of arrows. That was probably a good thing.

“Maybe it’s on the other side?” Dara offered, her eyes hopeful, glittering in the candlelight. “Whatever we’re looking for.”

“Could be.” It would take a full day on foot just to walk around the remains of the tower, and candlemarks even on Companion-back. “Dara, I don’t know…” It felt pointless. She had mentioned thinking that there might be a literal entrance to some underground chamber, but Karna had never heard of any such thing, and Vanyel couldn’t see how anything like that could have survived the initial blast.

“I’m glad to have seen it,” Dara said, half in a whisper. “Even if we don’t learn anything, it, just – it drives home the scale of it, you know?”

_Trust me, I know. _It had been sinking in all day. This was the place where Urtho, the Mage of Silence, had died.

It couldn’t be the way Leareth had wanted it to end. Even if all his principles had been a lie, and at the beginning of it all he had just been seeking power, he wouldn’t have wanted most of the once-kingdom of Tantara turned into a cinder. Or to lose all the precious knowledge that had been in Urtho’s Tower, and in his mind.

Had Ma’ar wept, when he learned that Urtho had gone out in a storm of fire rather than leaving even a chance that his enemy would take the stronghold?

There might not have been time for him to learn of it, before the counterattack that had completed the Cataclysm, Urtho’s hypothesized weapon. Ravenwing’s people hadn’t know what the interval was. They had seen the horizon light up just candlemarks after Ravenwing Gated out, and, days later, the ‘storms’ had arrived, though Ravenwing hadn’t called it that. All Gifted had been incapacitated, especially the mage-gifted. Strange circles had appeared in the ground, and the plants, animals, and occasionally people inside were transformed – like the Pelagirs, but worse.

Vanyel found it hard to imagine that Urtho, who hadn’t been able to bring himself to destroy one city to halt his enemy’s progress, would have handed over a weapon that would do so, so much worse.

Then again, he knew as well as anyone that people would make bad choices when they were tired, and after the final, desperate days of the war, Urtho had to have been as exhausted as anyone had ever been. He should have known better, but maybe that was a lesson he had never had a chance to learn – most of his life and work had been in peacetime, for all that there had apparently been low-scale war nibbling around the edges of Tantara for a generation before Ma’ar’s meteoric rise to power.

It felt unfair; Urtho hadn’t deserved those kind of consequences for a very understandable mistake; but that wasn’t the way consequences worked. Vanyel knew that more than anyone.

“Van?” Dara said.

“What? Sorry.” He gave her a sheepish smile. “I’m tired, apparently.”

“We should go to bed soon.” She gestured vaguely at the tent. “I put up the covering for us, so we can sleep in.”

They had been trying to rise with the dawn on the journey here, to make good time, but there would be no particular rush tomorrow morning. About a quarter of Vuy she'edras, Clan of the Wolf, was here, taking their turn standing guard around the Tower itself, but Vanyel had pitched their tent on the other side of the well and cluster of trees around it, so they ought not to be disturbed.

“In a few minutes.” He was tired, but he wasn’t sleepy yet.

Dara was fiddling with a long stalk of grass, sticking the end of it into the flames until it caught, then pulling it back smouldering. “I miss the littles,” she said, absently. “Hearing them play.”

“That part was nice.” An’dora’s children had swarmed him every time he visited Pretera’sedrin Camp, eagerly asking to ride Yfandes or give her treats or braid her mane – or his hair, which they seemed to find fascinating in its mix of black and silver. He had asked An’dora at one point if she let them do that with _all _her patients, and she had only smiled and said he brought it on himself by humouring them.

“You’re good with littles,” Dara said, turning and smiling, the firelight making a halo of her short, sun-bleached hair. “Are you going to have children some day? You’d be such a good father.” 

“…What?” He stared at her.

“I mean, Katha is. I heard Keiran was thinking about it…” She broke off a length of straw and tossed it into the flames. “I might. Depends how things go in the next few years, I guess.”

Oh. Vanyel hadn’t even considered that aspect – Dara was still sixteen, she was barely old enough to have considered the question, and her life had been snatched off track, first by Rolan, then later the second blow, learning about Leareth.

It was easy to forget how young she was. _She’s more mature than I was at twenty-six. _Easy to forget that behind her steady, composed eyes, there must have been _some _kind of struggle to come to terms with it all.

“I doubt it,” he said lightly. “I mean, it would be difficult, given certain facts about my life.”

Dara tapped at her chin. “You don’t need to have a partner. Katha doesn’t.”

Vanyel bit down on his wince. _She doesn’t mean to be hurtful, _he told himself firmly.

“Your friends Starwind and Moondance did it,” Dara pointed out.

Dara didn’t know about Brightstar’s parentage, he realized – it wasn’t really a secret, but she had barely spoken to Starwind or Moondance outside the Work Room, where their arrangement had been very far from the main topic of interest. Enough people in Haven knew of it that she probably would find out someday, but he didn’t feel like enlightening her right at the moment.

“It’s different in k’Treva,” he said, his voice cooler than he had intended.

“Mmm,” Dara said, nodding. Vanyel’s Empathy was picking up a stifled embarrassment from her. _She’s worried she hurt my feelings. _

“I don’t mind it,” he said. “It’s not like I looked forward to it, when I was heir to my father’s holding and expected to produce heirs of my own at some point.”

Dara’s nose wrinkled. “I mean, does anyone? It’s such an odd way to think about it. Produce. Like growing vegetables or something. Not _children_.”

“I suppose it is odd.” He remembered how his own parents had barely interacted with him; he had been mostly raised by his wet-nurse, and then by Lissa. “It’s the way the world is.”

Dara flung the remaining length of grass into the fire. “Doesn’t mean I have to like it.”


	17. Chapter Seventeen

_– Sinking below the earth, through the stone, down and down and down – _

_– Suddenly, a space opening – _

_– The soft glow of a mage-light, illuminating uneven stairs carved into the raw stone – _

_– Turning, and there was a mass of glazed rock like a waterfall frozen in mid-stream, blocking the passage to the surface – _

_– Following the stairs, a spiral, down and down and down – _

_– A stone door – _

Dara found herself blinked at the ceiling of the tent, the image of the door still half-superimposed on her vision.

The light in the tent was dim, patterned through the black felt; it made it nearly impossible to tell what time it is, but her gummy eyes hinted that she had been asleep for a long time – and, when she rolled over, she saw that Vanyel’s bedroll was empty.

_:Rolan?: _she sent.

_:Chosen: _He was already awake, and responded instantly.

_:Foresight dream again: _Dara sat up, stretching, automatically reaching for Need’s hilt; the sword lay next to her bedroll, sheathed._ :Um, I’m going to just get up and I’ll show you and Vanyel both: _

When she lifted the tent-flap, the midmorning sunlight nearly blinded her. She sneezed – why _did _sudden bright lights make her sneeze, she had never understood that part – and stood blinking, a hand shading her eyes, until she could make out anything at all.

No wonder it was so bright; the sun was glancing right off the pale, shiny slope of Urtho’s Tower.

She found Vanyel under the nearby cluster of trees, sitting on a rock, his hands cupped around a mug of chava. In front of him, a ring of smaller round stones circled the remains of last night’s sad little dung-fire, and their pot was off to one side, a rime of chava-paste at the bottom

Dara smirked to herself. She had been the one who thought to go to Jor’ethan before the camp departed, asked how they made chava in the first place, and then haggled to buy several pounds of the ground-up beans that needed to be boiled with water. It probably wouldn’t be enough to last them the entire time, and Vanyel was rationing himself to one cup a day – without milk or any sweetener added, it must have been disgusting – but he had been _very _grateful, and Dara was quite smug.

“Morning,” she said, squatting. “How long have you been up? Did you take your herbs?” It was the first time on their journey that she hadn’t been awake before him.

He looked sheepish. “No. ‘Fandes reminded me, but I realized I wasn’t sure of the dose. I should probably take it soon, I’m getting a headache. Can you…?”

“Of course.” Poor Vanyel, he looked so embarrassed about it. “I’ll show you how to measure it. Um, how did you make the chava?” The cinders inside the circle of rocks looked cold.

“Just used a heat-spell on the water, it was quicker. I should light a fire for you, though.” He grimaced. “I don’t want to use too much magic here, it might offend Karna and there’s no way of replenishing my reserves.”

“Because there aren’t any nodes?” Need had mentioned that.

“Exactly. It’s bizarre. I mean, deserts have less energy about, it seems to indirectly come from life nearby, but it’s not _that _arid here. I would expect some.”

“Hmm.” Dara stood, started to turn, and then remembered. “Vanyel, I Saw something again.” The stone door still shimmered against her eyelids when she closed them. “The stairs and the door, only this time I turned around, and it was blocked. It looked the same as the surface – like everything melted and collapsed.” It hadn’t really sunk in at first, she had been too sleepy, but the excitement was thrilling in her chest now. “I think it’s real. I think there’s something still down there. Ravenwing did say the Tower had as many floors below as above – maybe there’s some sort of dungeon level, and it was deep enough that it wasn’t destroyed?”

“Hmm.” Vanyel lifted a hand to his chin. “Remotely possible, I suppose, but I don’t see how it helps us, if it’s buried under a hundred yards of rock.”

“Couldn’t you tunnel down with magic–”

“I _really _doubt Karna or the shaman would approve of that.”

A fair point. “Something with your other Gifts? If you could use Farsight and then bring things up with Fetching…”

“I’ll think about it.” Vanyel’s voice was closed-off, brooking no further questions. 

* * *

Jisa was in a bad mood.

To start things off, it had been a_ very _frustrating day in her lessons with Terrill, who she personally didn’t think was nearly as skilled as Melody. The worst part was that she wasn’t sure he tried very hard. The patients he had taken over all seemed to like him, but Jisa thought that was just because he was so calm and pleasant to be around.

He was a very nice young man, that was true. Melody wasn’t always nice, but she said that sometimes being firm or even harsh was kinder in the long run, and Jisa agreed.

Terrill vaguely disapproved of blocks as well; they had that much in common, but Jisa had never been able to start an actual conversation with him about it. He didn’t seem interested in the theory the same way Melody was. Even more annoying, he wasn’t a very strong Mindspeaker, and he couldn’t manage a Mindspeech side-conversation with her when they were seeing a patient together. It made it much harder to ask questions when she had to remember and save all of them for afterwards.

Worst of all, she didn’t think Terrill actually liked teaching. He had asked her to tutor her new fellow-pupil Jeren rather than doing it himself, saying he was too busy, and that would have been fine in itself, but Jeren was fifteen and it was clear he didn’t think much of learning from an eleven-year-old girl. He was polite to her, but Jisa could tell when someone was being condescending, and she hated it.

She missed Melody _so much_.

After that, she had found out that Beri was going to be leaving, because she was getting married. Which was very exciting for her, and it was true that Jisa was old enough not to need a governess, so she had no real grounds for complaint; she had put a bright face on it and congratulated Beri warmly. Mama had suggested that she could take classes at the new Collegium for non-Gifted students.

Jisa didn’t especially want to sit in a classroom with a lot of spoiled highborn children who were both older than her _and _behind her in the material. Mama had pointed out that there were a few lowborn there already, on scholarship, and there would be more in future years as the temple schools improved across the Kingdom, and that was true, but Jisa still preferred to read books at her own pace.

She was going to miss Beri, who had been with them nearly as far back as Jisa could remember. It would be so much lonelier in Mama’s quarters without her there.

She needed time to herself, to get used to the idea, away from Mama who was very stressed. That was why she was riding around outside the Palace walls by herself. The stablehand hadn’t quibbled when she went to Goldie’s stall and asked for help saddling her, she could almost do it by herself now but she wasn’t quite tall enough. The Guardswoman at the gate hadn’t said anything when she rode past, only nodded to her.

Goldie was an _old _horse now, she was almost fifteen, but the mare was still healthy and willing. She came from Forst Reach, a gift from Uncle Van, and Mama said that the Ashkevrons bred their horses well. Goldie had been Mama’s first horse of her own, and Jisa had learned to ride on her. She had dropped two foals – one of them, a colt called Apple, Mama had given to Beri as a Midwinter gift – but they were both nervy, and Jisa liked Goldie best.

Mama let her go where she wanted now without an escort, she said Jisa was old enough for that, but probably she wasn’t _really _supposed to go outside into Haven proper with no supervision. Jisa didn’t care. She wanted to be alone right now.

She was riding on the east side of the Palace, the trade-district, narrow but clean streets lined with shops and taverns, apartments on the second and third storeys with laundry hanging below the windows, tall rickety wooden buildings pressed up tightly together like they were cuddling to keep warm. Jisa wouldn’t have risked going to the Exile’s Gate district by herself, even though Stef had told her about going there in disguise and it had sounded awfully exciting. This part of the city was perfectly safe for a girl her age to be alone.

She was there, and that was why she smelled the smoke.

_What? _Jisa pulled back on Goldie’s reins, stopping the mare in her tracks, and looked around. Listened.

In the distance, she heard shouts. Cries.

Jisa remembered how it had felt when the demon-creatures had attacked her and Mama, years ago. The terror had seized her, and at first she hadn’t been able to do anything except cling to Mama’s skirts and scream, but then Herald Jaysen had gotten there with his mage-barrier, and Jisa remembered how everything had suddenly felt very clear and sharp and quiet. She had watched Herald Jaysen die in Mama’s arms, with Savil holding his hand, and she hadn’t even cried at first, not until later when it sunk in that it was really over, she was safe, and _that _was when she had started trembling and sobbing.

That was how it felt now. Not on the outside, but inside her, some small corner of stillness and calm, the world turning to crystal.

_There’s a fire. _

She knew exactly what Uncle Van would have done.

A moment of hesitation – she wasn’t a mage – but Uncle Van had said that didn’t matter. She could still do the right thing, and she wasn’t powerless.

Center and ground, and open.

It took Jisa only seconds to find the terrified cluster of minds – there! She leaned forwards and dug her heels into Goldie’s sides, and the mare broke into a reluctant trot, then a canter. It was impossible to coax her to gallop anymore, but that was probably a bad idea in these crowded streets anyway.

It wasn’t until ten or fifteen seconds later that Jisa thought of the obvious thing. She widened the net of her Thoughtsensing, this time searching for the distinctive, blazing-silver feel of a Companion.

There! _:Herald!: _Jisa sent, hammering at the woman’s shields. _:Help, there’s a fire!:_

_:Who is this?: _Confusion.

_:Jisa. Just come! It’s in the trade-district, by the–: _Jisa twisted her head around, trying to get her bearings, _:–by Allart’s Shoemakers: _She dropped the connection before the Herald, whose name she didn’t know either, could ask what exactly the King’s bastard daughter was doing in the trade district.

The screams were closer, and the smoke blew into her face, a hot stinging cloud of it. Jisa coughed, pulling up the hem of her gown over her mouth and nose.

She couldn’t tell which shops were on fire – the awnings and lettering were already obscured by flames. People were standing back from the violent heat of it, a crowd forming, someone was already setting up a bucket brigade. She saw that they were drenching the surrounding buildings first, to prevent the fire from spreading further.

Their surface minds were full of controlled fear. It was the minds behind them that were screaming in panic.

Jisa closed her eyes. _What do I do? _

She couldn’t put the fire out. It was stupid to go any nearer; she already felt like it was half-singing her skin, and Goldie was shying back, unwilling to move closer.

_Maybe if they were calm, they could get out. _

It came to her in a flash, and Jisa took a deep breath. This was going to be the hardest thing she had ever done before. Uncle Van had said once that when she was grown-up, she would be able to calm or rile up an entire crowd – well, she _wasn’t _full-grown, and she had never tried to use her Empathy with more than one or two people at once, but she knew how strong she was.

Jisa closed her eyes against the burning smoke, and _pushed_.

_:Stay calm!: _she Broad-sent, she didn’t really know the trick of Mindspeaking to the un-Gifted, but maybe some of it would get through. _:Help is coming!: _She hoped that was true. _:Stay calm and try to find a way out!: _

There were children in there; Jisa could tell from the smaller, hotter glow of their minds. Unshielded, she could feel pain and panic and horror, it was almost too much to bear…but she could stand it for five minutes, surely.

She pushed as hard as she ever had, calm and soothing, until the insides of her eyelids danced with spots and her head spun.

It was helping, but not enough.

Jisa bit her lip. _I need more. _She reached deep into herself, like a plant sucking up water from its roots, everything that was in her, every part of her that screamed that she couldn’t let helpless children die–

**:Stay calm: **she sent. **:You need to focus. I’m going to help you. Everything will be all right: **

–Suddenly dizzy, Jisa clutched at the pommel of Goldie’s saddle, nearly falling. Mindspeech had never felt like that before, and she didn’t really know what had just happened, but _something _had changed. There was a sudden echoing silence in her head. A listening feeling.

Jisa opened her eyes, blinking away streaming tears. An older, grey-haired man was nearby – he seemed to know what he was doing, she thought, he was quite steady, and she saw him gesturing and mouthing something to two young men, then turning away–

“Hey!” she shouted, coughing, catching his attention with a gentle tap on his surface thoughts as well.

The man waved both arms at her. “Get back!”

“No!” She managed to force Goldie forward another few paces. “I can help! Listen to me, I’m Gifted and I can talk to the people who’re trapped, I just need your help to tell them what to do!” She broke off, coughing again.

The man stood rigid for a moment, staring at her. “I don’t – you’re not a Herald-trainee…” He trailed off. “I’ll take it. Listen, I know the layout. Where are they?”

Jisa closed her eyes, Reaching. “About twenty people in the cellar, I think, the air’s better and they ran down there when they realized there was no way out. And there’s maybe five trapped upstairs, they can get to the window, but they’re littles and they’re afraid…”

She opened her eyes in time to watch the old man nodding briskly, and open his mouth – he started to speak, a rattle of words, almost as fast as Melody when she lectured Jisa on something. “If I send some folk out back, I know there’s a cellar-window into the garden, it’s shuttered and barred but we can get a crowbar. I need you to tell people to stand back as far as they can, so no one gets hurt, and then to help boost each other out, children first. It’s going to start filling with smoke down there – tell them to dip any item of clothing in water, if there’s any down there, and breathe through that.” A pause for breath. “As for the littles upstairs… I’m afraid you do need to tell them to jump. Tell them we’ll catch them as best we can, and a broken leg is better than dying up there.”

Jisa nodded, seriously. “I’ll do that.” She closed her eyes. Breathe. Focus.

Reach.

…Half in trance, Jisa didn’t hear the first Herald arrive. Or the second, or the third. The grey-haired man had helped her down from Goldie’s back when she asked, she didn’t want to risk pushing herself too hard and falling out of the saddle, and she was sitting on the opposite side of the street, fighting with every fibre of herself to maintain her hold on the terrified crowd inside. It was hard, it was _so hard_, it felt like holding up a very heavy weight with aching arms, and there were tears of pain and frustration joining those from the smoke, but she wasn’t going to give up.

The children upstairs first. She told one of them, the oldest she thought, with a gentle Mindspeech probe resting on his oddly quiet surface thoughts, that he needed to grab something heavy and break the window. To her surprise, he listened immediately, and then followed her instructions to carry the others over and help boost them up and coax them to jump over the rising flames into the waiting arms below – brave arms, belonging to brave people, who were willing to stand close enough that the fire singed their eyebrows and reddened their faces.

She didn’t think any of them had broken legs, though there were at least two sprained ankles, and one of the catchers had dislocated a shoulder. Jisa wasn’t trying to shield at _all, _right now, and so she was picking up everything, whether or not she meant to.

The old man didn’t even have to come back and tell her, when the last bar in the cellar-window was finally pried out – she sensed the relief in a dozen minds, they were huddled back, coughing and covering their mouths and noses, as the basement slowly filled with acrid smoke, the ceiling smouldering. One corner had already started to crumble in, shedding embers onto the packed-dirt floor, and between that and the clear space needed around the window, there wasn’t much room.

With Jisa still feeding her Empathy in, the evacuation was quite orderly. She sensed rather than saw as the children were lifted up first into waiting arms, to be immediately carried back from the smoke, and then the adults started to boost each other up, calmly, steadily, one by one…

–When half the ceiling finally came down in a thunder of flaming timbers, Jisa nearly lost her hold on them. Watching through their eyes, it had startled her as well, but she tamped down the panic before it could rise. _Stay calm. Almost there. _There were only nine people left inside the building, now. 

One man was trapped under a fallen rafter, his leg shattered. Jisa reached for two of the others with Mindspeech and asked them to please help free him, and lift him out first, and then _hurry _– but calmly, calmly…

And then they were all out.

Jisa waited until she was sure the last of them was well away from the flames before she let up; she didn’t want them to belatedly panic and start flailing, maybe hurting their rescuers.

_:You’re safe now: _she Broad-sent; this time, Mindspeech felt normal again, though it hurt like grinding broken glass into her skull. She was so tired.

And she let go of her Gifts, sagging back against the wall behind her.

_I did it. I can’t believe I did it. _

She had gotten everybody out alive. Well, not everyone – she had learned by observing the surface thoughts of the survivors that at least three people hadn’t made it to the basement in time, and must have been dead of the smoke before she arrived. But she had saved everyone she possibly could have.

It felt good. It felt very, very good. Almost enough to blot out what was quickly becoming the worst headache of her life.

_I should probably move. _Jisa opened her eyes.

–And found herself staring right into the face of a concerned golden-haired woman in soot-smudged Whites.

“Jisa?” the woman said, eyes widening. “Someone told me you were here helping, but I didn’t – are you all right? You look–”

“I’m fine,” Jisa started to say, but it came out as a slurred mumble, and then her vision went hazy, and then everything faded to black.

She woke up in a bed, naked with a blanket over her. It was dim and quiet, she could feel a cool compress on her forehead, and someone was holding her hand.

Jisa tried to reach out with Thoughtsensing, to see who it was, and immediately changed her mind. _Ow. _

“Where am I?” she croaked, without opening her eyes. Her throat hurt, and she started coughing, which made her head feel ready to explode.

“Jisa!” Mama’s voice was a low murmur, which she was very grateful for. “You’re in the House of Healing. Shielded room. How are you feeling?”

Awful. “Thirsty,” Jisa managed.

“All right, well, let’s get you sitting up a little and you can have a few sips of water.” Mama lifted her up against some pillows, very gently, without jostling her at all, and then held a cup to her lips and let her have one tiny sip at a time. It hurt to swallow, and her stomach was upset, but afterwards she did feel a little better.

“How long?” she whispered.

“How long were you unconscious? About two candlemarks.” She felt Mama brushing the hair back from her forehead. “You weren’t hurt at all, just drained. Which I imagine feels bad enough. How’s your head?”

“Ow,” Jisa complained, whining.

“I thought as much. I could bring you some willowbark, but I had a better idea. Thought I might ask Stefen to come sit here with you until the worst of it’s past.”

“Isn’t he with Papa–” Jisa started.

“Not anymore, pet. Randi was over here the moment he heard what happened. He stayed with you the first candlemark, but he wore himself out worrying and I sent him off to rest. He’ll be all right in the morning.”

Jisa felt a little guilty. She hadn’t intended to pull Papa out of an important meeting, much less give him a bad shock that would send him to his own bed – and she should have guessed exactly that would happen.

She felt Mama’s lips brush the crown of her head. “I’m very proud of you, pet. Herald Sia says you saved the lives of twenty-six people in that building. She said no one else in all of Valdemar could’ve done what you did.”

Jisa didn’t know what to say.

Mama’s voice hardened. “And I’m also very angry with you. You were being reckless, you put yourself in danger, and you know _exactly _how upset your papa and I would be if anything happened to you.”

Jisa whimpered. She opened her mouth, to protest that it hadn’t really been dangerous, she hadn’t gone in close – and she closed it again, because that was a lie. It _had _been dangerous. She had gone into trance sitting next to a building that was on fire. If it had gotten out of control, maybe she would have realized and been able to run away in time, but maybe not. Especially not once she was too tired to stand up.

_It was worth it. _

It was the promise that her Gifts made on her behalf – that she could help others, and so she would. _I know you want to help the Kingdom, _Uncle Van had said to her._ You will. I believe in you. _

She understood the other thing he had said better as well, now. _The Gift you do have is even rarer than mage-gift, and Valdemar needs it just as badly. _Even Uncle Van wouldn’t have been able to do what she had.

He could have put out the fire with a wave of his hand, of course, but still.

He understood. And so did Mama, in the general case, it was clear from everything about how she lived her life – but Jisa wasn’t sure if she was ready to understand it in the very specific case of her own Gifted, disobedient daughter.

Mama’s fingertip caressed her cheek. “I know it was worth it, sweet. You were very brave.” A heavy, weary sigh. “I just wish… It’s hard, you know? Watching you grow up on me, seeing how strong you are… I’d hoped a Mindhealer would have a safer life than a Herald, but Melody’s gone into combat zones often enough.”

Mama didn’t talk like that often – there was a nakedness in her voice, something held wide-open.

“I’m sorry,” Jisa whispered. “I’ll try to…be more careful…” Distance wasn’t such a problem for her. She could have done what she had from a lot further away – well, no, she had needed to talk to someone, to figure out what to do, but she could have gone in and then gone _out _again, it would have taken extra time but maybe that was worth it…

Jisa was feeling dizzy again. “…Mama, can I lie down?”

“Of course, pet.” Pillows shifted, and Mama eased her down onto her back, pulling the blanket in to her chin. “Jisa… I wish I could tell you that you didn’t need to, that you’re only eleven and you shouldn’t be risking anything yet – but I know it doesn’t work that way. You couldn’t have walked away without trying, could you?”

“No.” Never.

“Well,” Mama said dryly, “I suppose I know exactly whose daughter you are.” She stroked Jisa’s hair. “Shush. Rest, now. I’ll go hunt down Stefen.”

Jisa curled up under the covers. Stef, she thought, was never going to let her live this down. 

* * *

_:’Fandes: _Vanyel sent. _:Tell Rolan to have Dara come this way, now: _

He could probably have reached her himself with Mindspeech, but he couldn’t spare the energy or attention to try it.

They had decided to spread out, taking opposite directions around the Tower, intending to meet on the other side. Dara was with the shaman, Vel’asha shena Liha'irden – who was, after all, a Gifted mage, her innate potential somewhere around Master level, though of course she knew no real spells and her Sight wasn’t trained under any system Vanyel knew. She still might be able to pick up something. Maybe even something that he couldn’t, given her close connection with her Goddess.

Vanyel still wasn’t very comfortable around her. She made him uneasy in the same way Karis had at first.

He was with Karna, which suited him much better. She was mage-gifted as well, but with only hedge-wizard potential. Still, she had told him that she thought she felt something, and Vanyel had stopped at her word, and started using _all _of his Othersenses to focus on the stone immediately under their feet.

It was common wisdom that enough rock in the way would disrupt many forms of Sight, and it seemed that was true of mage-sight, here; he could feel _something _different about this patch, when he really focused on it, but it was murky.

Farsight, however, wasn’t blocked. It was a lot more _effort _to move his mental ‘eye’ downward through the fused, ancient sheet of stone, and it seemed fairly pointless – obviously he couldn’t See anything, it was exactly like pressing his whole face up against a cliff – but he could tell that he _was _moving.

–Until, suddenly, it wasn’t a cliff-face anymore. There was still nothing to See, only blackness, but it was an _open _sort of blackness, and obviously a chamber hidden deep underground would be dark.

It was taking most of his strength just to hold his Farsight-viewpoint, but slowly, anchoring on that point, he was able to reach through with his mage-gift, pushing hard to feed through the tiniest tendril of energy.

Just enough for one small mage-light.

There it was. Exactly as Dara had described it, and showed him hazily in her memory of it – a staircase, crudely hewn from the bedrock, curving down.

_It’s real. _

The shock of it made him promptly lose hold of his Farsight – but it would be a lot easier to find a second time, now that he had more than a bearing and a vague sense.

_:’Fandes: _he sent – no words, just that mindtouch.

_:I know, love: _

He opened his eyes, still kneeling on the glassy earth. Karna was looking right into his face.

“You Saw something,” she said. “What?”

“Dara was right.” He still felt stunned by it. “There’s a staircase down there. Everything above it sort of…sagged, melted it closed. But some of the lowest levels must have survived intact.”

* * *

Savil had carried a cushion into the Web-focus room with her, since she expected to be here for a while. Maybe she ought to ask the Palace workers to pad the damned bench – no, this was a Work Room, albeit an unusual one, and it was a terrible idea to keep anything flammable around that couldn’t be easily removed. The cushion would do fine.

_I wish Randi had sent me north. _She hated being this far away, able to intervene only indirectly, passing on observations via Kellan and down the Mindspeech-relay – which was fully staffed for this particular mission, at least, they could get a detailed message back and forth within minutes without tiring anyone unduly.

Kilchas and Sandra were with her, sitting on opposite sides of her around the bench. She could feel Kellan, and the other two Companions as well, close with them in the silver weave that was the Web.

Savil was Valdemar, its rivers and roads were her arms and legs, and she could feel every Herald in the Kingdom, tiny points of light, like someone had thrown a handful of diamonds into a field.

She couldn’t feel Vanyel at all. _I wish you were here, ke’chara. _Randi might have risked sending Van north to handle their little situation directly, and even if not, she would have felt a lot better with him at her side.

They had two Herald-Mages on site, she reminded herself. Vatri, who was the most powerful up north – about as powerful as Mardic had once been, alone – and Elaina, who was weaker but more experienced. Tamara was still riding the far northwest circuit; there were enough Pelagirs-beasties wandering in on a daily basis that a Herald-Mage was needed.

_:They’re moving in: _Kellan sent.

Focus. Savil leaned further out into the Web, her own body receding. _Damn it, Van, we could use your Farsight. _Sandra was managing the scrying-talisman, and could relay to her, but it was too distracting for both of them to stay in the full rapport needed to share senses directly.

She and Vanyel didn’t have that problem. They had done enough concert-work, over the years – and, if she was honest with herself, emotional closeness helped as well, made it easier to drop and merge that deeper level of shields.

–The Web roiled.

_:They’ve been noticed: _Kellan sent, unnecessarily.

Somewhere, three hundred miles away, someone was throwing blood-magic around. Savil felt it like a stain spreading across her own clothing.

_:Shield-talismans are active: _Kellan added. _:All according to plan, so far: _

There had been extensive Farsight scouting, but the bandits’ stronghold itself had resisted any attempt at Farseeing inside. Meaning it was shielded. They had a good sense of numbers, though, because the group in question didn’t seem particularly concerned with concealing their departures and arrivals. No wonder; until Valdemar expanded its borders, there had been no one who could threaten them. Savil thought they might have recently increased the security precautions they took, after news of the annexation finally filtered through; the undergrowth had been freshly trimmed back from the fortress, clearly at a great deal of effort, and there was a perimeter of sentries.

_:Check how many mages you can sense: _Kellan sent.

Savil stretched out her Othersenses even further. _:Four. I think: _Everything was ‘blurry’ at this distance, stretched through the odd distortion of the Web, and the bandits were intermixed with the family blots of mage-energy and thoughts that were her fellow Heralds.

_:That’s Kilchas’ count as well. Let me…: _She felt the familiar tickle as Kellan watched through her eyes. _:Agreed. Can you take any of them out?: _

_:Not without risking hitting one of ours: _Aiming through the Web was always touchy, and she had to go for power over precision. Vanyel’s Mindspeech was strong enough that he could kill with it, even at a distance, through the Web; that offered a lower risk of collateral damage, though overall she was glad it wasn’t an option for her.

…One of the minds winked out.

She felt Kilchas tap at her shields. _:You’re welcome: _he sent, and she could feel his revulsion and nausea leaking through.

Right. Kilchas was a more powerful Mindspeaker than her, had been on the relay before.

_:That’s all I can manage: _he sent. _:Sorry: _

_:That’s all right: _At a glance, the fighting seemed to be well in hand. Blood-power was splashing around, but _her _people were shielded, every single one of the Heralds wearing one of Sandra’s shield-talismans, Savil and Vanyel’s design.

_:Elaina’s in: _Kellan sent.

Herald-Mage Elaina had never liked combat very much. Savil remembered sitting in Jaysen’s suite, years ago, a cup of wine in her hand. _Sweet girl, couldn’t hurt a fly. Feels like teaching Shavri to kill. _

She pushed back the pang of grief.

In any case, Elaina had one advantage, and that was her incredible talent with illusion-magic. It took barely a whisper of power, so her weak Gift wasn’t much of a limitation; the difficulty was in control, and in holding the illusion in mind. Elaina had a nearly perfect visual memory. She could slip past even the most alert Gifted sentries, unseen.

Katha had begged to have her as an agent, for that reason, but at this point in time they couldn’t spare one of exactly nine Herald-Mages just for that.

_:Vatri’s getting a little overwhelmed: _Kellan sent. _:Sure you can’t try for one–:_

Savil’s mage-sight whited out.

_Oof. _It felt like a blow to her own body – no, like an ember had fallen onto her skin. A white-hot flare of power.

You couldn’t actually hear the Death Bell ring, from behind the shields of the Web-room, but Savil didn’t need to; she _felt _it, deep in her bones, she was the pattern that lay behind Valdemar, the fabric that was its Heralds, and she felt the threads ripped out into nothing.

And fell back into her body with a thud, her forehead suddenly throbbing. Next to her, she heard Kilchas’ startled grunt.

_:Sandra?: _Savil sent, pulling both of them into a link. _:What–:_

_:It just–: _Sandra’s mindvoice was unsteady. _:Whole place just went up like a bonfire, and then I lost my scrying-point: _

Dead silence.

_:Final Strike?: _Savil guessed, but it didn’t feel right – she had been Looking at the other mages as closely as she could stand to, and she hadn’t felt that intention form.

_:No. I think it was some kind of artifact. A failsafe: _A pause, and she could feel the other Herald-Mage trying to collect herself.

_:We lost Elaina and Vatri: _Savil sent, still half in shock. How? What had they missed? It had happened in an instant, no time to see it coming let alone stop it, but it still felt like she ought to be able to reach out and, and…

Kellan poured into her mind, a flood of light. _:I’m sorry, Chosen. It wasn’t your fault: _

That was so incredibly not the point.

_:Heralds Chavan and Sindia as well: _Kilchas added. _:The others… Elavi must be alive, or at least I didn’t feel her die: _

Elavi was a strong Farseer, but had no other Gifts and only marginal Mindspeech with her Companion. She would have hung back, and had the best chance of avoiding whatever _that _had been.

_:Is she hurt?: _Savil sent.

_:I don’t know yet. Waiting on the relay: _

Probably there was something she should have been doing, Savil thought vaguely, other than sitting and waiting. She couldn’t think what, though. It seemed like it was all over, on a note of finality – whatever the cause of that final blaze, it had killed all of the bandits as well as the Heralds, and presumably most of the Guard who had gone in with them.

Why?

_:Oh!: _Sudden hope rising in Sandra’s mindvoice.

_:What?: _Savil sent.

Kellan answered for her. _:Word through the relay. There were children in there. Slaves, it looks like. Elaina got them out to one of the Guardswomen under illusion, had them ride as fast as they could, she wanted them clear of the fighting. They’re badly hurt – they weren’t shielded from the blast – but they’re alive:_

It wasn’t really that much good news, in any objective terms – the same number of Heralds were dead, they had lost two mages and that was by far the most significant outcome of today’s disaster – but Savil felt her own mood lifting very slightly.

At least they had salvaged something.

* * *

“I have an idea,” Vanyel said quietly.

It was evening, the third full day they had been on the site of Urtho’s Tower, and they were sitting around a dung-campfire. Yfandes was curled at his back, and he leaned on her, one hand looped around her neck.

Vel’asha, unsurprisingly, had immediately vetoed the idea of tunnelling down – not that Vanyel was sure he _could _have done that, even with magic. A hundred yards of rock lay in their way, and there was very little ambient energy around to use. Operating solely at the rate his reserves could replenish from food and sleep, it would take him months if not years.

Still, and somewhat to Vanyel’s surprise, Karna had pushed her to consult a higher authority, and so Vel’asha had waited until nightfall, gone into trance, and presumably stepped out into the Moonpaths to talk to one of the _leshy’a Kal’enedral. _The answer had still been no.

Which made a lot of sense to Vanyel. One of the biggest elements of protection was that it would take even an Adept-class mage months to reach the supposedly buried weapons, and meanwhile they would be a sitting target for the Shin’a’in warriors. He didn’t want to be responsible for peeling away that barrier.

He glanced around the circle. Vel’asha’s eyelids were at half-mast, arms folded. Karna leaned in, her lips slightly parted. Dara was resting against Rolan’s neck, a tired curiosity showing on her wind-chapped face.

“It won’t involve tunnelling,” he said. “I can’t Gate there as is, even with Farsight – it’s too murky, Gating needs a firmer target with more senses involved. But Dara pointed out I have Gifts other than mage-power, including Fetching. I can’t Fetch myself there,” Mardic could have, maybe, if he’d had Farsight, but Vanyel’s Fetching wasn’t reliable or strong enough to risk it, “but I might be able to Fetch a lightweight object. Something that weighs less than a pound.” He took a deep breath. “A Gate-arch is usually built of stone, but it doesn’t have to be, and it doesn’t have to be thick either.” He hadn’t tested that theory, but it seemed like it ought to be true.

Dara’s eyes went wide. “Oh!”

“So my thought,” Vanyel said slowly, “is that I can built a small portable Gate-threshold, use Fetching to move it to the top of the passage, and combined with being able to See it with Farsight, that ought to count enough as ‘knowing’ the place, that I should be able to use it as a Gate-terminus to get in.” Gating ought not to be affected by the stone in the way at all – it bypassed the space and obstacles in between entirely, via the Void.

Silence.

He ducked his head. “Karna, Vel’asha – I guess it’s up to you. If you think your Goddess would find that acceptable.”

Vel’asha’s eyes were troubled. She lifted a hand to rub the side of her neck.

“I mislike it,” she said finally. “This place should be impregnable.”

“It _would _be,” Vanyel pointed out. “And it still will be. To anyone else. I can’t think of a single other person who’s ever had Fetching, Farsight, and mage-gift, all strong enough to do this.” He hesitated. “Dara’s Foresight told us to come here at all, and Karna is the one who directed me where to look, or else I’d never have found where the stairs started. Maybe the Star-Eyed wanted you to know.”

“Hmm.” Vel’asha features were an unreadable mask.

“Shaman,” Karna said finally, in oddly formal tones. “I think it is true, and our Goddess wishes us to do this thing. It is perhaps information that our people will need to survive.”

Her voice was level, calm, but Vanyel could read the tint of eagerness in it. _She wants to see what’s down there. _Unsurprising – she was a historian, a scholar, of course she would want to see whatever was left of Urtho’s workshops.

Vel’asha turned away, her eyes questing the starry horizon. “I will need to think on it,” she said softly.

A moment later, she rose gracefully to her feet, slipping away into the darkness.

_:Dara?: _Vanyel sent. _:What does Rolan think?: _

_:He’s for it: _Dara replied instantly. _:…I’m not sure why. He’s holding something back from me: _

The discomfort in her mindvoice was clear. Vanyel frowned; he didn’t much like it either. 

* * *

Melody sat with her elbows resting on her thighs, chin in her hands, bringing her eyes down to the level of the small boy sitting in the too-big chair – but keeping her distance, her own stool was a good two yards back.

He was clean, and dressed warmly in an oversized shirt and trews; both of those things were an improvement, from what she had heard. Burn-scars seamed his face, and his forearms were still bandaged; more bandages showed at the neck of his shirt. The Healers at the Westmark compound thought he was around five years old, though he was tiny, all stick-thin limbs and too-big, shadowed eyes that didn’t match that young face. His hair had been almost entirely shaved off, to deal with the lice.

“My name is Melody,” she said, in slow, careful Valdemaran. “What’s your name?”

No answer. He only hugged himself, rocking.

_He might not speak the language. _Melody tried again, this time in the trade-pidgin dialect that was common across much of the north – it was mostly derived from Valdemaran loanwords, but with a thick accent that made it nearly incomprehensible to outsiders. She was good with languages, and had been picking it up rapidly.

The boy pulled his scrawny knees in to his chest and wrapped his even skinnier arms around them. He wouldn’t meet her eyes. “Damen,” he mumbled.

“Damen.” She smiled, not too broadly. “I’m very glad to meet you.”

The Healers said he hadn’t been as difficult as the older child they had found with him, a girl of about eight. She hadn’t spoken a word since Herald Elavi dragged her out the of the bandits’ fortress minutes before it exploded, and she tended to wildly attack anyone who came too close, biting and scratching, then lapsing into limp passivity when she was restrained. They didn’t even know her name yet. She was in very bad condition, physically; the Healers doubted she would have survived the winter if she hadn’t been rescued. They weren’t sure she would survive even now. Like poor Herald Elavi, she had been injured much worse in the final blaze – both of them trying to shelter the younger boy with their own bodies.

“Damen,” she said again. “You’re safe now. Do you understand? The bad people aren’t going to hurt you anymore.”

He stared at her, his expression dead, eyes haunted. “Ma’am, r’they dead?” His accent was thick, barely comprehensible.

It took everything she had to keep her voice level. “Yes. They’re dead. And I’m going to help you.” _Gods, I hate working with children. _Especially children who had been treated as badly as these two. According to the Healers, the boy had been raped. Repeatedly. Though not as brutally as the girl, who they thought had likely been trying to protect him from that as well. _I don’t even want to think about it. _

She would try her best with him – not just because he deserved to recover as best he could from that trauma, but because she knew they needed whatever answers he could give them. Nothing had survived the blast, and the Heraldic Circle needed information on what had happened.

She had all of her Sight open, but the boy didn’t leak much. Though he wasn’t Gifted in the least, something had given him the sort of rudimentary shields that even the un-Gifted could develop if they were probed, repeatedly, by a Thoughtsenser or a mage. Damen’s mind was like a rolled-up rug – there was pain, deep below the surface, a bottomless pit of it, but she couldn’t _get _at it. Melody shouldn’t have been grateful for that, but she was, a little.

Give it time. She had to be patient, even though patience really wasn’t one of her strengths.

He was still afraid. “Damen,” she said gently. “What’s frightening you, right now?”

The child lifted his head. Tears swam in his eyes. “Th’said, f’I ever ran away…”

“You didn’t run away,” Melody said softly. “But, what did they say would happen?”

He was silent for a long time. Melody didn’t push, only waited. Patiently, damn it. _I’ll take all day if I need to. _

“Master Dark,” the boy whispered. “Rendan said…’e’d come fer me…”

Melody closed her eyes. _Oh, no. _

“Yer heard’ve ‘im?” Damen guessed. “‘E’ll kill ye...” And he started to cry. Without making a sound; tears ran down his cheeks, snot dripping onto his upper lip, all in utter silence.

_I mustn’t go to comfort him. _Not until he came to her, willing.

“He won’t,” she said, as levelly as she could manage. “You’re in the Kingdom of Valdemar now, Damen, and our protections are very strong. Master Dark isn’t ever going to find you. I promise.”

She was glad she was speaking out loud, in Mindspeech, because if she had been, he would have known she was lying. _I can’t be sure of it. _The Leareth that Vanyel thought he knew _probably _wouldn’t harm a defenceless child – but he might, if he felt it was worthwhile for some reason, and of course he might not be the person Vanyel thought at all.

And there was no guarantee that they could keep the man out of Valdemar.

She closed her eyes, silently making an oath. To herself, as much as to the child in front of her. _I don’t care what happens, I’ll keep you safe from it. _If Valdemar was taken, well, she would make sure he wasn’t in Valdemar anymore by the time the Kingdom fell. If she had to send him all the way to the Tayledras in k’Treva Vale to keep him out of Master Dark’s clutches, she would talk Savil into doing it. 

…Hells, maybe that was a good idea to begin with. They might be able to handle him better–

_You just want this problem to be someone else’s, _she thought wryly.

How she felt about it didn’t matter. It was hardly the first time someone had handed her an impossible task and told her to fix it. _You can do it._

* * *

It was the first meeting of the full Senior Circle in months, and words couldn’t describe how much Shavri wanted to be somewhere else.

Randi’s expression was calm, revealing nothing, but she could feel his seething anxiety through their bond. Tran was on his other side, visibly worried. And tired.

Her lifebonded laid both hands flat on the table, and the murmured conversations fell silent.

“I’m sure everyone has heard the news by now,” Randi said. “We received final confirmation this morning, from a, well, more reliable source.”

It wasn’t hard to be more reliable than a traumatized five-year-old, Shavri thought, and they pushed the thought away. The last thing she needed right now was to be distracted by terrible things happening to children.

“The child we rescued was able to point us to a Healer who worked for this ‘Lord Gelmar’,” Randi went on. “It’s a sad situation, actually – he used to be Valdemaran, born and raised in Polsinn, but it sounds like his parents wouldn’t let him go to Haven, the training he got with the village Healers was far from adequate, and he had a very hard time of it. At some point he decided to cut his losses and leave.”

Shavri had already heard the tale, that morning, but it still brought a twinge to her chest.

“Anyway, he went north as far as the road could take him, and settled a ways past Westmark. Set up shop as an animal Healer, concealed his Gift, and made a living well enough for a while…until someone found him. Someone who claimed to represent a certain ‘Master Dark’, and said that unless he went along and provided Healing services, their Master would find him and make him regret it.”

A sigh went around the room.

Randi’s fingertips tapped the table. Shavri could feel his pain through their bond, building, even in the comfortable padded chair he couldn’t stand to sit for long, but they couldn’t exactly have Stef in for this, and she couldn’t ask him to go into trance so that _she _could pain-block for him. He had taken the strongest painkillers that still left him clearheaded enough to run a meeting.

“He claims never to have met this Master Dark,” Randi went on. “Gelmar’s bandit-troop had a few hedge-wizards, though, and enough mage-artifacts to terrify him into submission. We may never know if Gelmar or his followers did meet Leareth face to face – we’re still searching the area for survivors who happened to be elsewhere at the time, and offering a hefty reward if any of the village-folk turn one of them in, but at this point I’m not hopeful.”

“But we know Leareth was sponsoring these bastards.” Keiran’s voice was flat and cold, and the words seemed to land with a thud on the table between them.

“We think so. They weren’t forthcoming to Healer Brodie, and the boy isn’t in any shape to tell us much.”

Shavri closed her eyes. There had been a girl as well, a little older, but she had died of her injuries – they had learned that this morning as well, and even though Shavri hadn’t been there, it hadn’t been one of _her_ deaths, she had found herself wanting to add the child’s name to her list. Except that they didn’t even know her name. The girl hadn’t spoken a word before she slipped away, and the younger boy hadn’t revealed it either.

Silence. Shavri made herself lift her head and look around the room, studying each face. Most of them were very controlled, stony expressions and wary eyes, revealing nothing.

_No one wants to be the first to say what they’re thinking. _

Which meant something was terribly wrong.

Keiran slammed her fist down on the table. “We have to _do _something, Randi. We’re wasting time!”

“Do what, exactly?” Katha’s voice was quiet, and there was a crack in it. “We don’t have the troops to mount an attack.”

“We don’t have Vanyel,” Sandra added. “That’s a little important.”

Silence.

Randi lifted a hand to his face, pinched the bridge of his nose. “Listen. I know this is upsetting, and we’re angry and want someone to blame, but…I’m not sure it changes anything, overall. So Leareth is using some very unsavoury bandits as catspaws. It’s hardly news – hellfires, Van took out a similar group near Polsinn back in seven ninety-one.” He laid his other hand down on the tabletop. “We lost people, but it’s only very indirectly Leareth’s fault, and it doesn’t make sense to base our plans on wanting revenge. We need to take our time and plan, and gather information, which is exactly what we’re already doing. I know it’s hard, waiting is the worst, and it feels like we’re not doing anything… But we are.”

The silence felt uneasy, Shavri thought. Unstable, like they were somehow balanced on the edge of a shale-cliff and any slight movement would send everything tumbling down.


	18. Chapter Eighteen

The air was very still. It smelled like stone, and age.

Dara had never been especially claustrophobic, but she was trying very, very hard to keep her breathing under control, as she followed Vanyel, who followed Karna, down the seemingly endless tunnel. Down and down and down. It was as though she could feel the weight of rock pressing down on her, crushing her lungs…

The air was good, she reminded herself – Vanyel knew a spell to measure air-of-life and the various other airs, including the ones that were poisonous, and he was drained but he had enough strength left to Gate them out instantly if anything went wrong.

_What if he trips and breaks his neck? _

He wasn’t going to. The stairs were rough-hewn, but well made, and completely dry, and there was a mage-light above their heads, so it was quite well-lit. Need was glowing as well.

She had Need at her side, she reminded herself. The sword was a mage _and _a Healer.

_:Rolan?: _she sent. She had to push hard, straining to maintain a link with him, but she could still do it.

_:I’m here, Chosen: _

Vel’asha had stayed on the surface. Even after she had spent an entire day in trance, presumably trying to commune with her Goddess, and she and Karna had _both _walked the Moonpaths together a second time to obtain advice, she hadn’t wanted to accompany them.

Vanyel had tried to leave Karna behind – hells, he had tried to leave Dara behind – but the Scrollsworn had pointed out that as a historian of her people, she was fluent in archaic Shin’a’in, both spoken and written, and would therefore be able to help interpret any directions.

Suddenly it was there. The door she had seen in her dreams. Dara felt dizzy for a moment, her vision shimmering, caught half between the memory and the present moment.

It was smaller than she had expected; scale had been hard to judge in the dream. Even Vanyel would have to duck to fit through.

Karna stopped walking, and shoved at it, with no effect.

“Stop.” Vanyel’s voice didn’t echo in the stone passage; it was oddly muted. “Let me?”

Karna moved aside, and he laid his hand on the door, closing his eyes. Dara clutched at Need’s hilt.

_:Steady, girl: _the sword sent. _:I’m not so fond of being underground either, but we’re safe enough: _

A moment later, Vanyel leaned back, and then swung forward, practically ramming the door with his shoulder.

It creaked open an inch. 

“Not locked,” he said, turning with a half-smile. “Only stuck. I suppose the hinges would get rather rusty, after almost two thousand years.”

Dara craned forward, trying to see what lay beyond, but there was only a sliver of inky darkness.

Vanyel laid his hand on the door, and pushed again, until it started to move with another screech. He sent the mage-light ahead of them.

“Oh!” Dara breathed.

She was looking out onto a sort of ledge, with a sort of knee-high railing like a balcony. Leaning forward, she saw that it wrapped all the way around a large, square space – or almost square, it seemed very slightly distorted, in a way that made her feel dizzy. The floor was recessed, and there was a sort of circular hatch or trap-door filling nearly all of it, wide enough to fit a small cottage through; one of the crescent-shaped ‘leaves’ was still cracked open, showing a wedge of inky blackness below. It was all very plain, in smooth but otherwise unfinished grey-brown stone – not quite a cavern or a dungeon, but not really a room either.

There were doors on each wall, small, identical to one they had come in through.

“Hmm,” Vanyel said, and stepped through. Dara bit back a yelp, _no don’t_, but nothing happened.

He steadied himself with one hand on the doorway, and tilted his head back. “Huh,” he added.

“Vanyel, what is it?” Dara said.

He turned over his shoulder. “Come on through. I think this passage must be some kind of servants’ back access-way to…whatever this is. There’s another hatch in the ceiling, but I really don’t think it’s possible to open it anymore.”

Dara found her feet frozen.

_:Come on, girl: _Need sent, impatiently. _:Move! Nothing’s going to bite you: _

She made herself take a step.

_Oh, gods. _Vanyel was right. The walls of the strange room were intact enough, though she noticed they weren’t quite in line anymore, but the ceiling had bulged out, half-buckling, like the stone had melted, sagged, and almost but not quite started to run.

Which was probably exactly what had happened.

“Looks like nothing above this survived,” Vanyel said, sounding disappointed. “I’m amazed this much did. Maybe most of the force of the explosion went upward, somehow…?”

“Perhaps the Star-Eyed had something to do with it,” Karna said softly.

“Hmm. Could be. I wonder what’s below?” And Vanyel started to swing his leg over the parapet.

“Stop!” Dara yelped. “Vanyel, what if it’s not–”

“Not safe?” He frowned back at her. “I don’t feel any mage-traps, and the floor looks solid. Very well-built, this place. But fine, I’ll be careful.” He reached into the pocket of his tunic, took out a pebble, and tossed it onto the floor.

Nothing happened.

“See?”

Karna had come through as well, and stood to one side. “Look,” she said. “There is a gate.”

There was indeed a gate, made of extremely rusted steel, at one of the corners. Vanyel tried and failed to open it, shrugged, and stepped delicately over, standing on the curved triangle of floor that was left by the circle-in-square formation.

Nothing happened.

“I wonder how you open this thing all the way?” He reached out to touch the side that was half open. “Hmm, see that rivet? I think maybe there was a rope attached, once, but it’s rotted away. Let me try…”

He closed his eyes, raised his hands, gestured – and with a scraping sound, suddenly the flaps began to move.

Dara gasped. It was a very strange effect to watch – there were slits under the balcony-like structure, and the four ‘leaves’ almost folded away into those openings, leaving a wide-open circle of darkness.

Vanyel was breathing hard by the time he finished. Dara was worried – if he tired himself too much to Gate, they might be stuck in here all night. She didn’t particularly want to sleep on a stone ledge even if it did have a railing to stop her rolling off, though it was an improvement over the stairs.

He leaned over the edge, and sent the mage-light flying down.

“Definitely some kind of room down there,” he said. “And there’s something odd on the floor, some sort of platform, I can’t tell from here… It’s a bit too far to jump, and we do need to be able to get up again. Karna, you have the rope?”

They had come prepared, since it wouldn’t be trivial to go back up for more supplies. Dara carried a rucksack over her shoulders, with food, water, a good steel knife, a flint-and-steel and a few candles. Karna had a heavy knotted rope coiled up and hooked over her shoulder, and her own bag of necessities.

“Of course. You wish me to tie it here?”

“Please do,” Vanyel said. “I want to see what’s down there. It feels – there’s mage-shielding down there. It’s like what we put on Work Rooms, but I don’t recognize the technique.” He closed his eyes. “I think there was outer shielding as well – see that sigil up there? Must’ve come down when the ceiling did. Absorbed the force of the explosion, and shattered. Maybe that’s the real reason why this area wasn’t destroyed. It’s a sort of vault.”

The Scrollsworn tied the rope firmly, using a sort of knot that Dara didn’t recognize, and then tossed the end of it over the edge. Dara heard the thud as the trailing end landed on the ground – or, no, a large circular platform, a bit smaller than the hatch above it.

Odd. It looked like it was made to fit through, but Dara couldn’t understand how they could get it up – there was no kind of chain or pulley.

“I’ll go first,” Vanyel said, and started to make his way down, swinging back and forth on the rope, until he alighted on the platform. He looked at his feet in apparent confusion for a moment, before carefully stepping to one side.

Dara followed, and was pleased to find she could do it more gracefully. A few feet above the ground, she hopped down–

The platform bobbed and jiggled a little under her, and she almost lost her balance. _What? _

“Dara,” Vanyel said, faintly. She turned and saw that he was off to one side, kneeling, one hand reaching over the edge.

“What?”

“…Don’t panic, but we appear to be hovering in midair.”

“What?” She clutched at Need’s hilt, immediately spreading her legs into a wider stance.

“I said don’t panic. There’s no sign it’s about to fall down.”

Dara could hear Need’s mental chuckle, which didn’t make her feel any better.

“It’s magic,” Vanyel breathed, “but I’ve never seen anything like it before…” Both hands were pressed flat to the edges of the strange surface. He raised his voice. “Karna!” he called out. “Come down, you should see this!” He glanced back at Dara. “We should get down, in case there’s a weight limit.”

He vaulted down onto the floor.

Dara sat down – it made her feel better, even if Need was laughing at her for it – and wriggled to the edge on her bottom. Once she was back on firm ground, and had confirmed that there was a good foot of air under the apparently unsupported platform, she thought to look around.

They were in a huge, roughly circular room, panelled in pink-veined marble, almost empty. Four large crystal globes hung from silver chains, evenly spaced around the odd hatch.

Around the room, there were sixteen very large, heavy-looking doors. Fifteen of them were closed. One stood ajar.

_:Very interesting: _Need muttered, half to herself.

By the time Karna had made her way down the rope and dismounted from the mysteriously hovering platform, with Dara offering a hand, Vanyel had moved on to examining one of the crystal globes above his head.

“I’m trying to figure out what that thing does,” he said absently. “It’s a mage-focus of some kind… Oh!”

“What?” Dara said.

“I think it’s some kind of permanent mage-light.” Vanyel raised his hand, gestured vaguely. “…No. It’s not meant to be activated with mage-power. How…?”

Dara didn’t know how she could help, so she said nothing.

_:It uses a spoken command, obviously: _Need sent, her dusty mindvoice radiating impatience, and Dara could tell by the way Vanyel’s shoulders twitched that she had included him as well.

Dara wasn’t sure why it was supposed to be that obvious. _She _had never heard of a mage-artifact that could be activated with just a word.

“Hmm,” Vanyel said under his breath. “Could be. Now, what would it be…”

“Let me try,” Karna jumped in. “It would perhaps be a Kaled’a’in word. _Lea’har… _No, not quite so.” She closed her eyes, and tried again, varying the pronunciation.

–Suddenly, the sphere of crystal flashed a brilliant white. Dara flung up a hand over her eyes, but it was unnecessary; the light was soft and steady, and didn’t hurt.

“Incredible,” Karna breathed. “After all this time…”

“I’m going to go see what’s behind that door,” Vanyel said.

It took two or three hard shoves to open it all the way, hinges screaming. _We ought to have brought oil, _Dara thought, making a mental note.

“I was right,” she heard Vanyel say. “It’s a Work Room. A very fine one.”

“Let me see.” Dara nudged in beside his shoulder. Vanyel stepped through, making space for her.

The floor was smoothly polished white stone with a pattern, a compass rose of eight points inlaid into the floor in pink granite. Curving white stone walls rose in a round conical shape, forming a peak about two storeys above their heads, from which another large globe of crystal hung on its own silver chain.

It was beautiful. It looked untouched – nothing was even dusty. And it was empty.

“Incredible,” Vanyel whispered. She had never heard his voice sound like that before. “Intact, after all this time…”

* * *

“So what do we have so far?” Vanyel said, sitting cross-legged on his bedroll.

Dara closed her eyes, thinking.

It was their second day in the vault under the Tower. The first day, they had done nothing more than explore. Vanyel, after forcing open the first of the other fifteen doors, had stared in silence for a couple of seconds, blocking Dara’s view with his body, and them slammed it and flopped back against the wall, shaking. It had taken five minutes for him to calm himself down enough to explain.

Apparently, they had found Urtho’s remaining weapons, at least the first of them. Vanyel hadn’t checked the other doors yet, but he suspected that was their purpose. Dara had immediately guessed that the empty Work Room they had come down into must have contained the one Urtho had ended up using.

Discretion was the better part of valour, and they had left those doors alone.

They had shimmied back up the rope, to see what lay behind the other three smaller doors. Vanyel had pushed for them to split up, and take one door each, but both Dara and Karna had strongly vetoed that idea. The last thing Dara wanted was to wander about this place alone.

The door opposite the one they had entered held another set of stairs headed upward, which ended even sooner in a tangle of rock and debris. The other two sets of stairs went downward, deeper into the bedrock, both eventually leading to wider hallways. One of them was impassible, the ceiling fallen in, but the other split off into multiple passages that seemed to go on for some distance. Dara had joked that they ought to bring in a ball of red yarn and string it along, like in that old legend, so as not to lose their way.

Maybe not the best omen. She had forgotten how that tale ended, which was very badly for the characters involved.

In any case, they had found a few more workrooms – not Work Rooms, these weren’t magically shielded, but ordinary rooms with sturdy stone benches, a few even containing some very old glassware. Most were disappointingly empty. One had a pump that somehow still worked, and drew up water that Vanyel said was safe to drink.

One had been sealed shut by magic, which Vanyel had dispelled with some effort – only after convincing Karna that the Goddess wouldn’t disapprove, which hadn’t been very hard, the Scrollsworn was clearly burning with curiosity. It had proved to contain a large number of sealed crates, made of lacquered wood that Vanyel had touched and said was preserved with magic as well. By that time they had all been tired, though, and Vanyel had Gated them back to the surface to sleep.

After a brief conference in the morning, Rolan had announced that _he _wanted to see the Work Rooms, and the weapons. Vanyel had, with some reluctance, decided it was safe to use the door of the empty Work Room as a Gate-threshold – but if he was going to raise a Gate of that size without Jisa’s help, he said, he wasn’t going to get them out again on the same day unless it was an emergency.

Which was why they were _all _down there, now. They had carried in their bedrolls and sacks of grain and pease and dried meat through the Gate while it was up, along with bales of hay for the Companions and plenty of straw for them to bed down on. Vanyel had raised his eyebrows at the sheer amount of supplies Dara had requested from the Vuy she'edras temporary camp, but Dara felt a lot more comfortable knowing they had _some _kind of backup in case there was a problem Gating out. She had brought her field-Healing kit as well, and all of the herb and their chava supplies for Vanyel.

They had lanterns, for Dara and Karna, and plenty of large parchment and writing-canvas sheets for note-taking – and for making maps.

Vanyel, exhausted and in some amount of pain after the more-difficult Gate, had immediately curled up on his bedroll and napped for the rest of the afternoon. Not that Dara honestly knew what time it was, now that they were meeting to discuss.

“I have something that you will perhaps be interested to see.” Karna hefted one of the lacquered boxes, carried back with great effort and lowered through the trapdoor in a rope-suspended basket they had thought to bring, into the center of the circle between them. Using the point of her belt-knife, she reached in and levered off the lid. “Look.”

Dara had seen it already, of course, but Vanyel hadn’t, and she heard his soft gasp.

“I have not yet dared touch it,” Karna said. “Since it is very old, and I am worried it might crumble into dust.”

“It won’t.” Vanyel’s voice was distant, with that awed sound in it again. “There’s a preservation-spell on this as well. A very, very old one.” He lifted a hand to his temple. “We still shouldn’t handle them too much, but you can take it out.”

Karna hesitated.

“Go on,” he encouraged. “They belong to your people, not mine.”

Karna closed her eyes, and her hand drifted out to touch the leather-bound book that lay just inside the crate. She breathed in and out, then opened her eyes, and reached in to grip it with both hands, delicately lifting it out.

It didn’t come to pieces – it _smelled _old, Dara thought, but no older than any number of books she had seen in the Palace archives.

“Open it,” Vanyel went on, half-whispering.

Karna lifted the cover.

Her fingertip brushed the first page. It was fine, creamy-textured – not paper, but Dara didn’t think it was vellum either.

“I recognize it,” Vanyel said. “Or I’ve seen something like it, anyway. It’s a special sort of rag-paper, made with cotton. Hard to make, so expensive, but very durable, even without the preservation-magic. Sometimes it’s treated with resin, which makes it tougher and waterproof, but I don’t think this was. See, the writing is in ink – if it were resin-paper, it wouldn’t hold ink, it would just bead off. That kind only takes graphite or charcoal, but it’s very good for work like Sandra’s, where you’re making notes right next to your experiments and it might get wet.” 

Did Vanyel just know everything about literally every topic? It certainly seemed like it sometimes.

The page was mostly covered in script – crazed, the letters running into each other in multiple directions, a corner blocked off for a diagram.

Vanyel’s breath hissed out. “Those are spell-notes,” he whispered.

Dara felt her eyes widen. “Urtho’s?”

“Perhaps.” Karna rested her finger on a strange sigil, etching into the fine leather on the inside of the cover. “That is Urtho’s sign.”

“I recognize it as well.” Vanyel had that awed look in his eyes again.

“This was Urtho’s private area of his Tower,” Karna said. “Most likely it was only his _hertasi _and his most trusted students who would come here. I thought he had sent all of his notes with the evacuation, but perhaps there was not time.” A smile crept across her lips, broadened until she looked like a child who had just opened a Midwinter gift. “I had never thought to see writing in his own hand…”

“Can you read it?” Dara said eagerly.

“Possibly, but with difficulty.” Karna shook her head. “It is in the old Kaled’a’in script, and it seems he did not write neatly.” She made a face. Maybe it was strange for her, thinking that her people’s ancient hero had had a flaw as banal as messy handwriting.

Dara could tell from the way Vanyel stared at the manuscript, almost greedily, that it was everything he had hoped to find.

She closed her eyes. _:Need, there’s no chance you read Kaled’a’in, is there?: _

_:I was a mage-smith, not a scholar: _A snort. _:Well, something of a scholar, but I never lived in this region, you know, and I’m starting to suspect the Kaled’a’in people came long after my time: _A hint of self-consciousness. _:I have all the skills I did in life, but I’m not so good at learning new ones: _

_:I’m not judging you for it: _Dara assured her, trying not to laugh – Need being embarrassed was sort of cute.

_:I resent that: _Need sent, but with humour.

“It will take time to translate,” Karna said. “I would have paper and pen.”

“Of course. We brought plenty.” Vanyel stretched, and then rose to his feet. “Do you want an assistant for it? Maybe you can borrow Dara – is that all right, Dara? Rolan and I can risk a look at those damned weapons now.”

_:I’d like to join them, please: _Need interjected. _:Weapons sound far more my speed than translation: _

Dara was happy to go along with that. _I don’t want to go near those things._

* * *

Dara watched as the light of the Gate faded away, and Vanyel sagged back onto his bedroll. She had kept her distance while he did the spell, not wanting to disrupt his focus, but she was at his side in a moment, placing a cup of tea in his hands.

“All right?” she said quietly.

“I will be in a minute. That one wasn’t so bad.” He tried for a smile, but it turned out half a grimace. “I’ll bring them back in tomorrow.”

After three days cooped up, the Companions had requested a few candlemarks to stretch their legs, breathe some fresh air, and graze on some real grass. Dara had thought about going with them, but Vanyel wanted to stay in the Tower, and so she had stayed with him.

It turned out they had gotten very disoriented about the time, in just three days underground – it was apparently the middle of the night in the outside world.

The big central room was starting to look quite lived-in. The Companions had their corner, including a water-trough – Dara had been the one responsible for lugging over buckets from the water-pump. The water tasted very odd, but Vanyel had promised it was safe, and she hadn’t gotten ill yet. They had a box of sand to ‘do their business’ in, and Vanyel had some kind of air-barrier spell over it to keep it from smelling.

Fortunately, they didn’t need a fire to keep warm – the air was quite comfortable, if anything warmer than Dara would have preferred.

Karna had set up her work area in the abandoned Work Room, since it had the best lighting and she could close the door for privacy. Dara had thought to bring oil for the hinges, and they didn’t creak quite so badly anymore. She had also helped carry over every single one of the crates from the room. Not all of them held books – some had small artifacts, that Need had offered to examine.

“I’ll need to rest for a bit,” Vanyel said, “but in a candlemark or so I would like to see what’s under the trapdoor in the duck-room.”

Dara smiled to herself. As they drafted maps of the surviving warren of rooms, they had named landmarks, and the room in question had a symbol on the door that probably meant something, in some ancient script, but did look rather like a duck. The room itself had nothing interesting in it, just the remains of a wooden table that had crumbled to dust when they touched it, and some smashed jars in the corner that might once have held food, medicine, or something else entirely. Dara had been the one to notice the very well-concealed trapdoor in the floor.

“I’ll come with you,” she said cheerfully.

Exploring was her favourite part of this, so far – she had taken notes for Karna several times, but she found it very repetitive, and the Scrollsworn tended to spend a lot of time staring at a single scribble of text and muttering to herself before she offered a tentative translation. The language had changed more from archaic Shin’a’in than she had expected, apparently, or maybe Urtho had learned a different dialect. He had been a lot older than Ravenwing, after all – no one knew his exact age at his death, but Adept mages lived a long time, and Karna guessed he had been over a hundred and fifty years old.

Dara missed Rolan already. It was impossible to Mindspeak with him from the large chamber, maybe because the area was still shielded; she could manage it about half the time from the top of the staircase, if she pushed hard and he was receptive. He had said he could reach _her _reliably when he tried, which only made sense – he could Mindspeak any Companion in Valdemar, all Groveborn Companions could, though even he was out of range of the herd now – but it still tired her to maintain that contact.

Vanyel just nodded, without saying anything. He was in more pain than he was admitting to her, Dara thought; just because Gating was easier for him now didn’t mean it was actually _easy_.

“You rest,” she said. “I’ll go help Karna some more.” And maybe Need would have some interesting commentary on the artifacts she was examining, to keep her entertained.

It was more like three candlemarks later that they made their way back to the ‘duck room’. Dara had ended up taking a nap as well – she found herself doing that a lot more down here, sleeping at random times when there was nothing to do.

Once upon a time, there had probably been some kind of clever mechanism for the trapdoor, with trigger-points. Dara had tried all the possible combinations, and the four points had depressed but it hadn’t _done _anything. Vanyel had looked at the thing with some kind of Othersight and said it was probably broken or stuck.”

Dara knelt on the stone, trying to wedge the end of her dagger into the fine, barely noticeable crack around the edge of the trap-door. _Almost there… _

The stone creaked, and moved the barest fraction of an inch. “Almost,” she told Vanyel, who was still examining the bits of gunk dried onto the jar-fragments.

It took three more tries, but eventually she was able to slide her hand into the tiny gap and feel the underside of the stone. She almost cried out as the heavy stone pinched her fingers, but gritted her teeth and lifted–

No. She was straining as hard as she could, and it wasn’t moving at _all. _

“I think it slides away into some sort of slot,” Vanyel said, helpfully. “Like the hatch. Push sideways.” A smirk. “Maybe someone tried to lift it like that, and it’s how it got broken.”

She stuck out her tongue at him, and then pushed, trying several different angles before she felt the stone start to move. It made a loud grinding sound, and Dara was panting by the time she slid it fully to the side.

She stared down into a pool of darkness. “Mage-light, please?” It was easier than lighting a candle, and would waste less air. They weren’t sure _how _the air stayed fresh down here, any more than they understood where the power for the permanent mage-lights came from; Vanyel thought it had to be another spell, pulling from a permanent energy-source like a Heartstone that was hidden somewhere or other, but he hadn’t tracked it down yet and Dara wasn’t sure how far she trusted it.

Vanyel came over and knelt next to her. “Oh. Interesting.”

It was a vertical passageway, round, the edges slightly rough – like one of the Palace water-pipes, Dara thought. Large enough for a grown man to fit, but no larger. _Fortunately, neither of us is fat. _There were handholds carved into the stone.

“Want to go down and have a look?” Vanyel offered, smiling.

Not particularly, that tube of darkness wasn’t exactly inviting and Dara was claustrophobic enough already, but she did want to see what was at the bottom. “All right. If you give me the mage-light.”

Vanyel laughed. “I’ll go first. Just in case there’s anything dangerous.”

He was in a good mood, Dara thought, and he seemed quite relaxed – it seemed that being deep underground and cut off from his Companion wasn’t bothering him as much as it bothered her, and it was obvious he was enjoying the opportunity to learn new things.

Heart in her mouth, she watched him slide into the hole, gripping the sides with both arms, lowering himself until his feet found one of the holds. He started to climb down, carefully.

“Oh,” she heard him say, his voice echoing oddly. “That’s the end of it… Come on down, I think it’s safe.”

Dara had to take a deep breath and center and ground before she could bring herself to follow.

She found him at the bottom, in a room that was just barely tall enough for him to stand up straight; she was an inch or so taller, and had to slouch to avoid banging her head. The entry-hole opened on one side of it, and the footholds continued down the wall to the floor.

The walls were lined with small stone cubbies.

“Storeroom of some kind,” Vanyel guessed. “I’m not sure why it’s so hard to get into. You take the right, I’ll take the left? Do be careful, please.”

Dara nodded and turned to examine the various nooks, starting at the top. The first few were empty. The fourth in the top row, when she reached in, proved to contain what seemed to be a silver cube, about as wide as her forearm.

She reached in with both hands and slid it out. It was much heavier than she had expected, and she nearly dropped it, quickly bringing it in to her chest.

“Dara!” Vanyel’s voice was suddenly alarmed, and she heard him start to take a step. “Dara, no, put that back right–”

“What–” she started.

He switched to Mindspeech. _:Drop it and get up the ladder. Now: _

_:I don’t–:_

_:NOW!:_

His hands were shoving her towards the back of the room, and Dara had never sensed that tone of alarm from him. She bolted for the exit-tube, grasping for the handholds, climbing as fast as she could.

Panting, she dragged herself out of the open hole onto the floor, rolling to the side. _:Van, what is it, are you–:_

_:Get out. Run!: _

She scrambled to her feet and sprinted for the open door, an instant before the world lit up as bright as the inside of a sun. Dara tumbled out into the hallway, falling, catching herself on one shoulder and rolling, and even with her eyes squeezed shut and her arm flung over her face, the light still blazed through her eyelids.

There was no sound of an explosion – but she was still Mindtouching Vanyel, felt his mental scream of panic and effort, he had been only halfway up when the – whatever it was – happened, she felt how every scrap of his power poured out into holding a frantic, desperate shield–

Then his mind whited out in agony, and a fraction of a second later she lost the link.

Something roared, a sound like thunder that rattled her bones, and then it was all over and she lay on the stone floor, shoulder aching, half-blinded, half-deafened, blinking away the tears that streamed from her eyes.

_:Vanyel?: _she tried, but she couldn’t feel him at all.

_Oh, no… _

It took her three tries to struggle up to her knees, and she didn’t bother to stand, just crawled forward, finding the door mostly by feel, she shoved her way through and searched the floor with her hands.

The edges of the tunnel were hot.

No point trying to light a candle, her hands were shaking too hard and she couldn’t see much anyway through the spots. Dara lowered her legs into the tube of stone, arms trembling, and her bare feet found one of the holds – the rock nearly scorched her, but she ignored it and kept climbing, trying over and over to reach for Vanyel with a Mindtouch.

The inside of the tiny room was full of acrid smoke that made her cough, but it wasn’t hard to find Vanyel – when she lowered her foot, questing for the floor, she almost stepped on him. He had fallen in a heap right at the base of the quasi-ladder.

_Don’t panic don’t panic don’t panic–_

There was some light, dim and reddish – everything was blurry, Dara’s eyes still weren’t working, and it took her far too long to realize that it came from Vanyel’s tunic, which was sullenly smouldering.

_Focus. _He was literally on fire, dealing with that that was the first priority. Dara yanked off her own shirt, it was oven-hot in the room anyway, and tried to smother the fire, scorching her hands in the process but that didn’t matter, didn’t matter–

He was sprawled facedown, Dara couldn’t tell if he was breathing, she felt for a pulse at his neck but her hands were still shaking and she couldn’t tell. She didn’t want to move him, not when she had no idea what his injuries were.

_Think. _

_:Rolan!: _she tried, desperately, pushing with all the strength she had left, but it was no good – either she was too far from the surface, or he wasn’t receptive.

_I don’t know what to do. _Her mind was stuck; she couldn’t think of anything at all.

Dara closed her eyes and curled into herself, weeping, feeling worse than she ever had in her life.

Seconds slipped away.

_:Dara!: _A faltering Mindtouch, fading in and out through the shielding. _:Planning to tell me what you’re in a knot about?: _

Dara sat up with a start. Oh. Of course. She was officially the world’s biggest idiot – she had entirely forgotten about Need.

Dara reached back with every scrap of her remaining strength. _:Vanyel’s hurt I messed up it’s my fault he might be dying I can’t I don’t know what to do I can’t–: _It all came out in a tumble of incoherent Mindspeech, she was still sobbing and she couldn’t seem to stop herself.

_:Calm down!: _Like a mental slap, and Dara had the eerie sensation of someone dumping a bucket of ice-water over her head – and it worked, she felt her heart rate slowing. _:I’m coming: _Need added, more gently. _:Did you forget that I’m a Healer? I do need you to stop panicking and make yourself useful: _

_:I’ll try! What do I–:_

_:Is he breathing?:_

_:I can’t tell, it’s dark–:_

_:Just stay calm. You can do this: _Dara could feel Need stretching out to her with all of her considerable strength. _:Listen. I need you to lean in close–: _

And she felt the tickle behind her eyes that meant Need was taking over her body. Dara hadn’t known the sword could _do _that at a distance – and it was weaker, she could have resisted easily, if she had wanted to, but she didn’t see the point. It wasn’t like there was any chance in the world she could handle this on her own.

* * *

“Stef!” Medren scrabbled for his roommate’s shoulders. “Stef, it’s all right, wake up, it’s just a nightmare–”

Stef was sitting bolt upright, fists clenched around the blankets. In the moonlight that filtered through their curtains, his face was drained of blood and white as the sheets, eyes wide and unseeing. His screams had yanked Medren out of a sound sleep.

Medren shook him. “Stef! It’s just me. You’re in our room, at Bardic–”

Stef blinked, sense returning to his eyes. “Medren, what…?”

“That sounded like a bad one,” Medren said, letting go of his shoulders. “Are you all right?”

Stef let his head fall into his hands, which were trembling. “I’m so sorry I woke you.”

“It’s all right.” Medren hesitated. “Want to talk about it?”

“I don’t–” Stef lifted his head, an almost apologetic expression in his face. “I don’t know what it was about, Medren. I, just – it was bad. Something wrong. Horribly wrong.”

“I get those sometimes too.” Not since he had been a child, though. Mother had called them night terrors, and he remembered how he would go crawl into her bed and stay there until morning.

“Medren, it felt _real_.” Stef’s face was half in shadow, eerie in the darkness. “I have a bad feeling. A really, really bad feeling.”

“Stef, you aren’t a Foreseer,” Medren reminded him. “It was just a nightmare.”

“What if it wasn’t?” His roommate lifted both hands, tugging at fistfuls of his hair. “What if it _was _real?”

Abruptly, he pushed his way past Medren and swung his legs over the side of the bed.

“Where are you going?”

Stef was already halfway to the door, a slight figure in a sleeping gown – like a ghost in the moonlight. “To see if Breda’s awake.”

Meden opened his mouth, to say that Breda was going to say exactly the same thing he had, but then closed it. If his roommate wanted comfort from an adult, one of the only adults he really trusted, who was he to deny him that?

* * *

He was in a place of featureless white.

For a moment, all Vanyel could do was stare at the Shadow-Lover, facing him in his pristine, unfinished Whites, golden curls, sapphire eyes in a shadowed face.

_Pull yourself together, Herald. _Get the most important part out of the way first. “Same choice?”

“Yes, but–”

Vanyel held up a hand. “Thank you. Going back. Tell me the rest after. I just…” He trailed off. The peaceful distance of the Shadow-Lover’s realm was soaking in now, and the shock and agony of his last conscious moments were fading.

The frustration and anger with himself hadn’t quite slipped away yet. Vanyel stumbled over towards one of the humps of white-on-white, and sat, letting his head fall into his hands. Jet-black hair, silky and untouched by white, drifted over his fingers. “Damn it! I was doing _so much better _at not being stupid, I’ve managed to go almost five years without nearly getting myself killed, and I had to go and ruin it.”

The Shadow-Lover joined him, sitting down near but not touching. “It was not your fault.”

“It kind of was. I was being an idiot. Assuming that just because the world-destroying weapons were sensibly stored, that there wouldn’t be anything dangerous where someone might set it off by accident just by picking it up… I mean, this is Urtho we’re talking about, he’s the mage who built sixteen weapons of mass destruction just because he could. I was being incredibly dumb. Careless. I guess we hadn’t found anything magical in any of the other secondary rooms, and I didn’t sense any mage-energies in that room either.” He wasn’t _that _stupid – if he had picked up on any hint of live magic, he wouldn’t have let Dara help him search. He had assumed it would just be more papers, or cryptic but harmless artifacts like the ones they had found packed away in the crates, long drained of power. “But we’re talking about the Mage of Silence, he _invented _spells and artifacts with no revealing signature, of course he would have made a weapon that even an Adept couldn’t detect until someone set it off. I wonder what it was meant to be used for…” Assassination, maybe – surely it hadn’t originally been meant to go off the moment someone touched it. Perhaps it had gone unstable with age. He really should have considered that as a risk.

“Why _did _I make that mistake? What was I missing?” It was a question he should have asked himself before, but at least he could ask it now. “Hmm. I was overconfident… Not really just that. I think I overestimated Dara, specifically. She’s been so impressive, she’s level-headed and mature, and I forget that she’s only sixteen. And she’s not a mage. She had no way of knowing what was safe and what wasn’t.”

No – that had been his responsibility. He should have kept her safe.

The last of the anger had drifted away now, and Vanyel stopped speaking and closed his eyes.

“Are you–”

He lifted his hand again. “Please don’t talk to me for a bit. I need to think.”

It was the first time he had seen the Shadow-Lover since Melody had helped undo the distortions that the Star-Eyed Goddess had left on his thoughts. The first time since he had sat down and really tried to think about the gods, and then talked to Leareth about it.

_Should I trust the Shadow-Lover? _

Somehow that felt like a wrong question. Why?

Well, trust wasn’t either-or, and it could mean a lot of things. Did the Shadow-Lover know true information? Probably. Did the Shadow-Lover have his best interests at heart? Maybe not. He wasn’t human, or anything much like it. Vanyel didn’t know _what _he was, and that ought to be a lot more unnerving than it felt right now.

An emanation of a larger god, most likely – and he didn’t have the faintest idea what that god wanted. For him to be alive, probably, but even that was only a guess.

It was hard to feel uneasy, here. He could think clearly, like nowhere else, or at least he had the illusion that he could – but he couldn’t really feel pain, or anything negative. That was its own kind of distortion.

He found himself wanting to talk to the Shadow-Lover, and he didn’t know if that feeling came from him, or from something else.

_I’ve told him everything before. _

That didn’t mean it was a good idea to keep making the same mistake. If it was a mistake–

Was it even possible to conceal information from the Shadow-Lover when he was here? If he could read it directly from Vanyel’s mind, then there was no point.

He didn’t know that, though. There was a chance that the Shadow-Lover could listen to his words, but not his private thoughts. Vanyel could take advantage of being here, but maybe he ought not to just ramble out loud.

And, well, sometimes in the past he had desperately needed a space to rest, when he wasn’t hurting – but he wasn’t craving that so much right now. It hadn’t been an easy year, at all, and there were obstacles that felt insurmountable, but from the outside looking in, the last six months had contained a great deal of forwards progress. Despite the weight of it all, lately he had been feeling _good_.

Which made this latest disaster all the more inconvenient.

To his own surprise, he was almost impatient to leave the Shadow-Lover’s realm and go back. _I have things to do. _But maybe not just yet. He had just gotten himself blasted, after all – he was likely to wake to sheer misery. Putting that off for a while was appealing.

It was _hard_, to hold the distrust in mind, an artificial loop of thought, reminding himself over and over.

He lifted his head. “I’m sorry. Just needed a minute.”

“You are troubled,” the Shadow-Lover said gently.

“Well. Yes. I just almost died.” He hoped the words didn’t sound too stilted. “You can tell me about the new information I need to know, now. I’m assuming that’s where you were headed, earlier.”

“Yes.” A tilt of that shadowed head. “One. Your chances are better than they were – and there is more than one path, now, that might lead to victory.”

“Good to know.” Vanyel waited for a few beats. “Can you tell me any more?”

No answer.

“Figured as much. Go on?”

The Shadow-Lover seemed to hesitate. “Two. You will not regret it in the end, I think, if you do choose to return – but you will perhaps regret it very much in the short run.”

Oh. It was yet another unnecessarily cryptic statement, but this time he guessed immediately. “Because I’m very badly injured and trapped in a buried vault.” Not just buried – under several hundred yards of heat-fused stone. “Without my Companion. And the only way out is to Gate, which no one but me can do. I really am an idiot.” Their plan had never been free of risk, and he hadn’t pretended it was, but he hadn’t thought through all of the things that could go wrong.

Unless… Need was an Adept-class mage. It was unclear if she had ever learned how to Gate, if so she hadn’t mentioned it, and it was additionally unclear if she could learn new spells now that she was a sword and didn’t _really_ have a full mind of her own anymore – but possibly.

He thought about asking the Shadow-Lover, or at least bouncing it off him to clarify his own guesses, but decided against it. The Shadow-Lover might not know about Need, and Vanyel couldn’t think of a specific way that the avatar of a god having that information could be damaging, but on general principle it seemed safer to keep it to himself.

…Damn it, this was _much _less useful without being able to take advantage of the Shadow-Lover’s patient listening.

Focus. What were the things he might want out of this opportunity?

Well, there were other questions he could ask. In fact, there were questions he had promised Leareth he would ask, if he ever had the opportunity. The Shadow-Lover was so damned mysterious, it wasn’t clear if he would get any useful answers, but it was worth trying, and he didn’t think the asking itself would reveal anything unacceptable. _The Shadow-Lover knows I’m insatiably curious. _

“I wanted to ask you some things,” he said. “What are you? Where did you come from, or who made you? Are you a facet of a bigger god, and does that god have a name? Do you greet everyone in the world when they die, or just people in Valdemar, or just Heralds?” If it was everyone, there was the question of how he could be multiple places at once, though maybe that wasn’t an issue for the avatar of a god.

_Are you on my side? _But that wasn’t a question where he would trust the answer at face value.

A warm chuckle. “So many questions. I see you have not changed.” Somehow, though the features were hidden, the shadowed face seemed to smile. “Even if I wished, Vanyel, I could not answer most of them. But for you, perhaps…” The eyes twinkled. “We do not serve Heralds alone, nor Valdemar alone, but I do not watch over an entire world either. I do speak for a god, whose name cannot be spoken in any human tongue. My purpose is as you know it – at the end of every life, I will be there, to offer comfort and ease.”

Vanyel frowned. Something was tickling at his thoughts, something that the Shadow-Lover reminded him of… “Oh! Were you ever human?”

“No.” A laugh that seemed to hold meadow-grass and summer sunlight. “Yet I am made to be closer to it, that I might speak to you more easily.”

“I see.” Think. Ask the right questions. “This god isn’t the same as Vkandis Sunlord or the Star-Eyed Goddess, right? Do They communicate, or work together, or trade? How are they related, I don’t know, do gods have families?”

“Not exactly. Your question has no simple answer. The gods do speak to one another. We are not the only force that watches over Valdemar. Beyond that… There are no words in your language for it.”

Vanyel sighed. _Be that way, then. _“All right. Can you tell me _why _you exist? What goals are you trying to accomplish, by greeting dead people?” And sometimes, rarely, sending them back to the world of the living. “Come to think of it, do you know why the gods in general care so much about humans?”

“Not only humans. You are not the only thinking beings in this world.” Another gentle smile. “You are precious. Minds that think and feel, that love and laugh… It would not do to let that be squandered. I am here to watch over and protect.” 

_That’s not an explanation at all. _“So people’s spirits are worth something to you,” he said. “I don’t suppose you know of any way that a spirit could evade you, and go back into the world without your knowing?” Leareth’s body had surely died at least once in territory that the Shadow-Lover’s god watched over.

“You speak of your Leareth.” There was something thoughtful in the way the Shadow-Lover’s shoulders moved, golden curls swaying. “I do not know. A dying spirit passes through the Void, briefly. Perhaps there is a way to hide that passage.”

“Right.” That wasn’t _zero _information, Vanyel supposed. “The Void… Is that what we call the Void-between-Gates? And, um, is it possible to…see into it, when alive?” He didn’t know ‘where’ the Moonpaths were, the strange dusty emptiness where he had once spoken to ‘Lendel, but he had a suspicion.

“Perhaps.”

“I’m going to take that as a yes.” This would have been very frustrating, Vanyel thought, if he had been capable of feeling frustration here. “Anyway. I think that’s most of my questions, but…I do wonder how your seeing-the-future works. And what the limitations are – for that, and for gods acting in the world in general. Because it seems like you aren’t all-powerful. Is that something you can tell me?”

Another chuckle. “I cannot tell you in words, Vanyel. Your mind cannot hold it. Of course there are limitations – the future is very large. Even a god cannot see and hold all of it. What you know as the material plane is not the gods’ native land; it is possible to act there, but it is not always efficient. Even the gods are not infinite, and must conserve their strength.”

“Mmm.” And the final question – the one he should have asked further. “Can you just _tell _me what you in particular want me to do?”

“It does not work like that.” The Shadow-Lover’s eyes were sorrowful, he thought. “I do not see the path from the same vantage point that you do, and so I cannot describe the steps you must take. I see only that such a path exists, and that the chances for your Valdemar are better if you are there to walk it.” The hint of an infinitely sad smile. “I can tell you that you have done so much better than anyone could have asked. You have been very brave, Vanyel, and I am proud of you.”

_I shouldn’t find that reassuring. _He still didn’t know what the Shadow-Lover wanted, or what exactly he meant by Valdemar’s chances being ‘better’. Maybe it wasn’t possible to know even in principle – maybe it would always be too big to fit into his mind, and trying anyway would only break him.

_I can’t trust him, _he reminded himself.

And yet, he still wanted to lean into the Shadow-Lover’s arms, to be held like a child again, in the one place where nothing hurt. Just for a little while.

Maybe it was safe to take some comfort. “Thank you,” he said. “Listen – I need to absorb this for a while, before I’m ready to go back. Can you just hold me?”

“You need only ask.” The Shadow-Lover sidled over and wrapped his arm around Vanyel’s shoulders.

He closed his eyes, leaning into the Shadow-Lover’s chest. It shouldn’t have been comforting, to rest in the arms of a god-avatar he wasn’t sure he trusted at all – but it _was _very soothing, and maybe that was only a strange distortion of the Shadow-Lover’s presence, but right at the moment Vanyel didn’t care.

_I’ll take what I can get. _It might be his last pain-free moment for a long time.

And he could try to think, even if he couldn’t talk about it out loud.

–That was harder than he had expected. His thoughts seemed to grind to a halt, without direction.

Start with something. _Imagine you’re talking to Melody. What would she ask you about? _

That one was obvious. He could even see her face in his mind’s eye, smiling slightly, eyebrows raised. _And how is everything with your lady Yfandes? _

Vanyel felt a smile coming to his own lips as well, unbidden; he wondered if the Shadow-Lover noticed. _Thank you, imaginary-Melody. _

How were things with Yfandes?

Better. A lot better. It had been a long time since he felt overwhelmed enough that he needed to shield her out for any significant length of time. He still caught himself blocking her from his surface thoughts by accident sometimes, purely on habit, but whenever he noticed, he would make a deliberate effort to let her in again.

The night that Dara had gotten back from her mercenary-job had been the worst, and even now, from the perspective of the Shadow-Lover’s realm, he thought it hadn’t been _that _bad. Not compared to other times. He could see why Dara had been worried, but even trapped in an inescapable vortex of loneliness and grief and confusion, he had known it would pass, regardless of what he did or didn’t do about it. He had remembered that it wasn’t reality, and even sort of believed it.

He had handled it far from perfectly, but mostly he thought he had done reasonable things.

Imaginary-Melody had a response to that, because of course she did. _Mostly reasonable, but you promised me that you would tell Dara if you were having a hard time, and you didn’t. _

He had eventually – but not without prodding, that was true. _I’m sorry, _he thought. _I was embarrassed. _

_Of course you were. _He could picture her making that face that she always did, somehow sympathetic and skeptical at the same time. What would she say next? _Vanyel, I swear, someday I’ll convince you that you don’t have to be embarrassed about…_

* * *

Dara’s knees hurt from kneeling on the stone floor. Everything hurt, really. Her shoulder still throbbed every time she moved it; she didn’t think it was dislocated, since she had been able to bear weight on that arm when she climbed down, but she had definitely pulled something when she fell.

Her own minor hurts were the least of their problems, though.

Karna had passed Need down the access-tube at her Mindspeech directions – the Scrollsworn wasn’t a Mindspeaker, which Dara hadn’t even remembered until later, but apparently it didn’t matter with her any more than it did with Rolan – and then dashed back for more supplies. Dara had followed Need’s instructions, or rather let Need control her body like a second appendage, turning Vanyel onto his back, once the sword confirmed that his spine wasn’t broken and she could move him safely. He was breathing, but very shallowly, and the pulse at his neck was rapid and weak.

Need was _glowing_, a faint golden nimbus – not much light, one of the things Karna had gone back for was a lantern. Dara had asked Need if she could do a mage-light, and Need had snapped back that she was a magic sword, not a god, and she really didn’t have any power to spare right now.

_:You need to get his clothes off: _Need sent, and Dara felt her body moving not of her own volition. _:His body is overheated_, _he soaked up a lot of energy in the backblow. Just use your belt-knife to do it without moving him. Karna’s bringing water. I’ll need you to sluice him down: _

Need had used magic to cool the air in the tiny room, and clear out the smoke – Dara’s throat was still raw from it, but she wasn’t coughing anymore and could mostly see. Her ears were still ringing, but she had been able to hear Karna’s shouted questions.

_She _was fine. Which made it all the more unfair. This was her fault as well. Everything that had gone wrong on this entire trip had been her fault, but this wasn’t the kind of mistake they could just move on from – and Vanyel was paying the price for it, not her.

_:You were both being idiots: _Need sent, acidly. _:Though not as much as thrice-bedamned Urtho, leaving something like that just sitting around! If the man weren’t already dead I would murder him with my own hands: _

_You don’t have hands. _It was an inane thought, nerves more than anything else, and Dara kept it to herself.

Vanyel’s hands and arms were burned, already reddened and blistering.

_:Least of my worries right now: _Need barked. _:None of his physical injuries are critical, but his mind is half torn to shreds: _

Dara didn’t understand what she meant.

_:Don’t you have a brain at all, girl? He tried to shield and redirect a lot of energy. Not Final Strike level, but starting to approach it. Miraculous part is that he got most of it, which is why you’re still alive. Lucky girl. I’m really not sure how he’s still alive: _

Oh.

_:I’ve never seen Gift-channels damaged so badly: _Need muttered. _:Stop thinking so loudly, you’re distracting me: _

Dara thought that was unfair, it wasn’t like she was putting any of her thoughts into Mindspeech – but Need was inside her base-level shields, she remembered, of course she was hearing all of it.

Center and ground.

It was hard, because she kept wanting to burst into tears. The room felt about a thousand times more claustrophobic, now that she knew they had no way out.

Need didn’t know how to raise a Gate. She had heard of it in her human lifetime, but it hadn’t been a known technique taught at the Sisterhood of Sword and Spell, and Need had spent most of her time since then asleep. She hadn’t shown much curiosity even after she was awake and had seen Vanyel perform the spell. _This old dog doesn’t learn too many new tricks_, she had told Dara, an admission of failure that must have come hard.

Karna didn’t know the technique either, obviously, and her Gift wouldn’t have been powerful enough anyway.

Their Companions were on the surface, and might or might not know that they were in trouble at all.

Trapped.

They were trapped – and if Vanyel died, they would be stuck here _forever, _until they ran out of food and starved. Even if she could reach Rolan and he could get a message out, she wasn’t sure what anyone was supposed to do about their plight.

_:Pull yourself together, child: _Another mental slap. _:Stop snivelling. I still need you: _


	19. Chapter Nineteen

_:I said careful!: _Need snapped in her mind. _:Don’t jostle him: _

“I’m trying!” Dara barked back, and then took a deep breath. “…Sorry.”

She and Karna had, by taking apart several of the varnished crates, strapping the slats together with twine into longer poles, and then cutting up the remains of Vanyel’s Whites and half of Dara’s blanket into strips to weave across, put together a makeshift litter. It was padded with Vanyel’s bedroll – bloodstained, because he had already been lying on it for the last day, unconscious at the bottom of the cellar-room. Need had said he was still too unstable to risking moving him.

The blade wanted him back in their main area now, though, with better light and ventilation and where all the supplies were. Getting him up the damned access-tunnel had been a nightmare that Dara never wanted to repeat, but that was likely to be the worst part. They had a solution for the hatch and the drop to the main vault-area; Karna had pointed out that the odd floating platform was probably meant for transporting heavy or bulky items from the rooms below up to the surface – or had been, when there had been a surface – and that it might not need a mage to use. They had tied ropes to the corners; there were actually eyelets there, maybe for that purpose in the first place; and used those to pull it up to the second level and moor it to the balcony.

Dara really hoped they weren’t about to find out the hard way that the enchantments had gone unreliable with age.

It was hard not to stumble, because she was utterly exhausted. She had sat up all ‘night’ with Vanyel in the dark, claustrophobic cellar, terrified every minute that he would stop breathing, or that she would set off some _other _weapon by accident and kill both of them. At some point Need had told her to sleep, and when Dara refused, Need had done something to _make _her.

–And woken her a candlemark later, because she needed to borrow Dara’s hands again. At this point, Dara felt like she was sleepwalking, staggering around through a dreamscape that was more and more a nightmare every minute. 

_:Stairs: _Need sent. _:Ready?:_

No, Dara wasn’t ready at all. Her fingers were going numb from gripping the slats, and her legs were burning, her breath coming in pants. “Need…have to rest…”

An impatient snort. _:You’d better. Can’t have you dropping him: _

It took them a half-candlemark, but finally, they had Vanyel tucked into the nest Dara had made for him, combining their bedrolls, hay stuffed underneath for extra softness. Every blanket and pillow had gone into putting it together, which meant Dara and Karna had nothing to sleep on except the Companions’ pile of straw. Oh well. It wasn’t cold, and they could huddle up.

Karna had barely said a word while they worked. She was closed into herself, her face an unreadable mask.

_Now what? _

It had felt like progress, while they were moving, but they were still trapped.

_:Stay on task, girl: _Need barked. _:Have another go at getting some fluids into him: _

It had been a frustrating project doomed to failure in the cellar-room; Dara had propped Vanyel’s head and shoulders in her lap, waterskin in her hands, but he had started choking and coughing every time she tried to tip water into his mouth.

_:You were giving him too much: _Need sent tartly. _:I can rouse him a bit, get him to swallow, if it’s only a spoonful at a time: _

“That’s going to take forever,” Dara complained.

_:Then you’d better get started now. He’s very dehydrated: _

They didn’t have much to use as bandages. Dara had cut up her own shirt into wide strips, and soaked them in water that Need boiled for her in their travel-pot; that had given her enough to keep the worst of his burns covered. She had a tiny jar of burn-salve in her kit; they were reserving it just for his hands. _It’s going to scar, _Need had said, _but I can try to make sure he keeps the use of his fingers. _

If he lived. Need was still saying that his physical wounds were the least of what was wrong with him.

_:One thing at a time: _Need sent. _:Water: _A pause._ :He needs salt as well, to replace what he’s losing: _

“We don’t have any–” Dara broke off. “Oh. We do have all that dried meat, it’s salted. I could soak it in water, make some broth.”

_:Do that. I can spare something to heat it: _

Spare something indeed. _You mean I can. _Dara was fairly sure that much of Need’s current strength was coming from _her._ She hadn’t been using her Gifts at all, but she still felt incredibly drained.

Need’s mindvoice softened. _:Why don’t you get yourself something to eat and drink first?: _

It seemed Dara didn’t have to – a second later, she felt a tap on her shoulder, and turned to see Karna holding out a cup of water and a piece of the jerky.

Food. That was something she hadn’t thought about yet. “Karna,” she said thickly, through a mouthful of the tough, chewy meat. “How long do you think we can we survive down here, with the food we have?”

Karna’s eyes played over the sacks stacked up in the corner. “The two of us? Our provisions will last perhaps a month, if we cut to winter-rations. At that point, we might survive about two weeks without food.”

“Vanyel as well,” Dara pointed out. “So more like three weeks before we run out.” And while two healthy people might live weeks with no food, if they had plenty of water, she doubted Vanyel would.

If he died, the stores would last longer between the two of them – Dara clamped down on that thought. _No. _

She closed her eyes, swallowing the mouthful of meat and chasing it with a gulp of mineral-tasting water.

Three to five weeks.

Before, it would have seemed like a eternity, but now it felt like no time at all – now that it might be all the time she had left to live.

Rolan had to be panicking. And even if she could reach him, once Need let her leave Vanyel’s side long enough to climb the stairs, Dara couldn’t think what he could do. Even assuming they could persuade the Shin’a’in to let them dig their way out, compromising the defences on the weapons, they couldn’t do that in a month. They had no tools…

_:Need?: _she sent. _:If Karna agreed to it, could you dig us out with your magic?: _

_:Eventually: _Almost an apology. _:The limit is power. I can draw on the your reserves, but there’s not much ambient magic to speak of: _A harsh mental snort._ :I could do it. In six months: _

Five more months than they had.

Maybe there was a tool Urtho had left behind…but it seemed doubtful that anything would serve their purpose. Setting off one of his weapons might blast through to the surface, but it would kill all of them at the same time.

_:And probably set off all the rest, and possibly a second Cataclysm: _Need pointed out. _:Let’s not: _

Dara closed her eyes against the threat of tears.

_We’re going to die in here. _It had been Urtho’s tomb, and now it would be theirs as well.

_:Don’t you give up on me, girl!: _Need sent sharply. _:We aren’t dead yet:_

* * *

“So,” Stef said, and there was something razor-edged in his smile. “You can control thirty people at once with your Gift?”

Jisa tucked her legs under her. “It was twenty-six. And I wasn’t controlling them.”

“Still. Pretty impressive. Even if you did knock yourself out for candlemarks doing it.”

Jisa had expected him to tease her about that, after she had given him such a hard time for fainting at the spring festival. She hadn’t expected the tone of challenge in his voice.

It had taken her a week to really feel like herself again. Mama had said that was normal – she was young, and already strong, but stamina would come with age. Gemma had only kept her in the shielded room for observation overnight, and then she had been confined to her bed for two days more.

It was still worth it.

Stef had been in a weird mood for days. He hadn’t said anything to hint at why, but he was on edge, fidgety, pacing constantly. This was the first time she had seen him still.

“Shavri says you’re the strongest Projective Empath in Valdemar,” Stet said, silkily. “Well, Breda says I have the strongest Gift she’s seen in a generation.” His smile was thin and fierce.

Oh. “Stef,” Jisa said carefully. “Are you _jealous_?”

“Jealous? Certainly not.” He waved his hand. “It just makes me wonder. Which of us is stronger.”

“They’re different Gifts!” Jisa protested. “You can’t compare them.”

Stef’s smile broadened. “Savil said Bardic is probably a variant of Projective Empathy.”

_How do you know what Savil says? _Jisa hadn’t realized they were friends.

“You’re more than three years older than me.” Stef was fifteen, or thereabouts – they didn’t know his name day. Jisa was eleven-and-a-half.

“Yes, well, you’ve had training since you were six, and I only started when I was ten. Wouldn’t you think that evens out?”

“No!”

Stef leaned forward, eyes flashing. “Sure you aren’t just nervous to find out?”

That was all Jisa could take. She folded her arms. “Are you sure _you _aren’t nervous? Remind me which of us just saved twenty-six people from a burning building.”

“The one who happened to be _there_,” Stef said. “Come on. If you really are stronger, I’m sure you can prove it easily.”

Jisa’s eyebrows rose. “Prove it how? If it’s something dangerous, Mama won’t–”

Stef cut her off with a raised hand. “Of course not. I wouldn’t want to upset your parents. I was just thinking a little…contest.” He grinned. “Medren can judge.”

Jisa tried to think. “Hmm. We should probably do it in a Work Room or something, with shields, or else I’ll hit everyone in the Palace.”

Stef nodded. “Good idea. For all we know, I might get everyone in Haven. I’m sure you can get us the keys to one…?”

* * *

_:Chosen! Dara!: _

Dara felt Rolan’s mindtouch just as she reached the point where the stairs didn’t go any further. She thought he must have been calling her name over and over for candlemarks – there was a desperation in the call that she had never sensed from him before, and wouldn’t have thought him capable of.

She reached back along the unsteady link, pushing through the resistance of a thousand tons of stone. _:Rolan!:_

–His relief echoed back along their bond. _:Chosen! What’s happening?: _

Dara burst into tears.

It was the sheer relief of it. The sobs shook her from head to toe, and she couldn’t even Mindspeak. Only cling to her end of the link, feeling Rolan’s light in her mind again, sinking into it like a warm bath.

_:It is all right: _he was sending, again and again, in words and wordlessly. _:I am here, love. Everything is all right: _

It really, really wasn’t – but it was good, to feel her Companion in her mind again. It was _so _good.

Finally, the tears slowed. Dara sat at the very top of the stairs, huddled awkwardly under the bulging frozen-waterfall, as if every inch closer to Rolan was the most important thing in the world.

_:Dara: _Rolan sent, his mindvoice firmer. _:Something is wrong. What?: _

_:Vanyel’s hurt: _A shuddering breath. _:I nearly killed him: _There, it was said, and the shame of it was a black cloud in her chest. _:It’s all my fault, Rolan, I set off one of Urtho’s weapons by accident. He shielded me, but he, he–: _She couldn’t finish.

_:But he is gravely injured. I see. Yfandes will be relieved to know what has befallen him, even if the news is not good: _

Of course. Vanyel’s Companion must have sensed that something was wrong; she would have been frantic, not knowing what.

_:Need is trying to Heal him: _Dara hadn’t remarked until the next day that Need hadn’t even complained once about Vanyel being a man. Need had overheard that thought, of course, and scoffed. _I hardly want to be trapped down here for the next two thousand years._ _Best way to get myself out is to make sure he can. Besides, he’s not so bad as men go. _

Which meant she at least thought there was a chance Vanyel would survive, and recover soon enough to Gate them out before they all starved.

_:Rolan: _Dara sent. _:Is there anything you can think of…?: _It was starting to tire her, to hold the link, like grasping something very heavy with just her fingernails.

_:I will speak to the shaman: _She could feel him thinking, distantly. _:If the Shin’a’in allow it, I might travel back to Valdemar and bring the other Herald-Mages: _

Dara didn’t actually see how that would help – and she very, very much didn’t want Rolan to be gone for the weeks it would take him to reach Valdemar and return.

_:They might use magic to tunnel from the surface: _Rolan pointed out. _:If the shaman will allow it. I suspect not: _

Dara hadn’t noticed the hope rising in her until it was brutally crushed. No, of course not.

Not even to rescue Karna, one of their own?

Karna was Kal’enedral. She would die willingly for her people.

Her strength was running out. _:Rolan: _she sent, all she could manage.

_:Rest, Chosen. I will be here. I am not going anywhere:_

* * *

Stef was nervous. He would never have admitted it to anyone, least of all Jisa.

He could tell that Medren wasn’t pleased to be out of bed at midnight, breaking curfew – but he had gone along with it, letting himself be dragged in his roommate’s wake. _He knows better than to get in my way, _Stef thought to himself.

They were in Sandra’s Work Room – Jisa said that no one used it very much. Sandra’s suite was one of the older, larger ones, from before the new Trainees’ Wing, back when Heralds had hosted two or three apprentices in their own quarters. Rather than adjoining a hallway, it had its own front door opening on the gardens, and the Work Room was around the back. It had a very large door, that looked like it had been a later addition.

Stef paced up and down his side of the dim-lit room; a mage would have used a mage-light, obviously, but they couldn’t and so they had stuck candles around the corners.

The strange restlessness had been with him for days, the feeling that something, somewhere, was _wrong wrong wrong _but he had no idea what. A new kind of discomfort had surged when they arrived – he had stood in Sandra’s back garden for a whole minute, looking around, unable to figure out why he felt so uneasy. Medren had dragged him inside before anyone could see them loitering.

Jisa was grinning. It was a little frightening. “Ready?”

Stef rubbed his hands together. “I’m ready.” He turned to Medren. “Tell us the rules?”

They had agreed that Stef would only tell his roommate they were having a Gift-contest, and Medren would be responsible for deciding how to judge it, so that Jisa knew he was doing it as objectively as he could and not biasing it towards Stef in some way. Stef hadn’t even tried to cheat by finding out the rules in advance and preparing.

Medren, sitting in the corner, folded his arms around his knees. “You’ll alternate. Um, I’ll flip a coin on each round to see who goes first. There’ll be four rounds, for four different emotions. I picked joy, amusement, anger, and fear. Whichever of you makes me feel it stronger, wins that round.”

Simple enough rules. Stef crackled his knuckles. _Bring it on. _

“Heads is Jisa, tails is you, Stef.” And then Medren flicked the coin from his thumbnail, sending it spinning into the air, and caught it in his palm, slapping his other hand flat on top. “Let’s see…” He lifted his fingers away. “Tails. Stef, you first.”

Joy.

Stef didn’t really expect to win this one – Jisa was the most joyful person he knew, she projected it just by existing– but he was going to try.

Now, what song to sing… He bent to pick up his lute, which he had brought with him.

“Don’t take all night,” Medren muttered. “New rule. Time limit, you have a count of fifty to plan what you’re going to do.” And he started counting under his breath.

Stef considered and rejected several bawdy love-songs. Joy wasn’t the same thing as fun, and he knew Medren quite well; his roommate would feel more impact from something more, not serious exactly, but with some depth to it. 

It came to him.

Stef adjusted the lute in his arms, and struck the first chord. His Gift rose easily, eager.

_Watch her as she steps along on her wedding day,_

_See her as she lightly glides on her wedding day,_

_Watch him as he comes along to take her to his heart,_

_Gently touching hand in hand they will never part._

Stef didn’t bother to picture the story in much detail – that wasn’t the way to do it, it wasn’t like getting married was something _he _particularly looked forward to with joy. Instead, he focused on his own personal greatest moments of happiness – and he didn’t try to convey that story, either, only linked the feeling of it in, tying it to the hazy image of a wedding party.

His first real meal with Bard Lynnell.

The day he had realized, and really come to believe, that he was at a school to learn music.

Medren’s tentative attempts to befriend him.

Breda’s quiet pride.

Meeting Herald Vanyel for the first time, and knowing that he was impressed.

_Raise a glass and raise a cheer for lovers on this day,_

_Take your own love by the hand it’s time to celebrate._

_Drink a cup and sing a song on her wedding day,_

_Kiss the lassie all night long on her wedding day._

Parties. Climbing into the loft with the other Bardic students, Medren’s cheeks flushed as he downed his third cup of pilfered wine. Dancing with Jisa at the spring festival.

_Watch her as she holds him near on her wedding day,_

_See how their lips lightly touch on her wedding day._

_Watch her as he takes her in his arms and rides away,_

_The love between them, heart to heart, will forever stay._

_Raise a glass and raise a cheer for lovers on this day,_

_Tie the ribbon ‘round her palm, it’s time to celebrate._

_Drink a cup and sing a song on her wedding day,_

_Tie the ribbon round her waist on her wedding day!_

The last chords of ‘On her Wedding Day’ from the Windrider Cycle died away, and Stef let his Gift trail off. Medren was leaning forward, chin propped on his open palms, a sappy smile on his face.

He really was a hopeless romantic. It was sort of unfair to Jisa, Stef thought – he knew Medren a lot better.

Medren shook himself. “All right. Jisa, your turn.”

She stepped forward, grinning from ear to ear – and Stef nearly fell over.

_– warm big arms lifting her into the air, holding her up to fly – the sky, when it was blue and perfect – a Companion filly nibbling the apple-pieces from her palm – running and running and running, the wind in her hair and the smell of flowers in her nose, until she tumbled over and rolled in the grass – falling asleep in her mama’s soft lap while the fire crackled. _

The flashes weren’t quite scenes, more the faint after-images of them – but the feeling of them was there, with the force of a hammer, flattening Stef against the wall.

“Oof,” Medren said quietly.

–The flood trickled to a halt. Jisa was breathing hard, cheeks flushed in the dim light.

Medren closed his eyes. “Jisa wins for strength, on that one. Stef, you were more subtle and skillful, but we did say we were grading on power. Now please give me a minute to catch my breath before the next one.”

* * *

_:Wake up, girl:_

Dara groaned, dragging an arm over her face, and rolled over. Something crackled under her, and she found her face pressed into a rough and itchy surface. She sneezed, which brought her fully awake.

Right. She was sleeping on a pile of hay that smelled like horse, because Vanyel was using her blankets and sleeping-mat.

She sat up. “Need, is something wrong?” Her voice came out a horse croak, and she tried to suck saliva into her mouth.

_:Nothing wrong, but you’ve been asleep for ages, and Karna would like a turn: _

“Sorry.” She yawned, rubbing her eyes. How she had managed to drift off and stay asleep with the mage-lamps on all the way and blazing down like the noonday sun, she wasn’t sure. Probably sheer exhaustion. Everything had been turning into a vague blur, and she didn’t even remember lying down.

“How is he?”

_:I think I have him stabilized. Finally had a chance to really assess the damage: _

“And?” Dara struggled up to her heels, then her feet. _Ow. _She was sore all over, the pain of over-exerted muscles along with with bruises and scrapes.

_:And it’s not pretty, but he’s going to live. He’s a lot tougher than he looks: _

Thank the gods. Dara’s knees went unsteady with relief. “Need, you’re incredible, I can’t ever thank you enough–”

_:Don’t get ahead of yourself. I think he’ll recover with his Gifts intact, eventually, but I’m not sure of that yet: _

“What?” Dread bloomed in her stomach. “What do you mean?”

_:His mage-channels are hanging together by a thread, and the other Gifts are damaged as well – they’re all connected, you know. And the places where they link up to his mind are burned, from where mage-energy spilled over into the physical plane. Even if the channels heal, he may not be able to use them, or he may have to start from scratch and relearn control: _

Oh. Dara hadn’t thought of that possibility at _all. _She tried to speak, but no words could make it past the sudden lump in her throat. She sank to her knees next to the nest of blankets. _:Need, please tell me you’re kidding: _

_:I wish I was: _

She closed her eyes, trying to think. “Something like this happened to him before. He was blasted by Gate-energy.” No need to tell the whole story. “It’s how his Gifts were awakened, but it burned his channels in the process. He wasn’t healing on his own, and no one in Valdemar could do anything, but a Tayledras Healing-Adept could.”

_:Hmmff: _Need sent. _:I’ve heard of them. I’m not one–: _as usual, there was irritation in her mindvoice, Dara thought that Need hated to admit there was anything she couldn’t do or anything that others could do better_ :–but I’m no slouch as a Healer, or as an Adept, if I say so myself: _

Dara was trying to remember the report she had read in the Archives. There hadn’t been very many lines on it, but… “Need, the problem then was that he had no training or control, and he kept using his Gifts by accident and making it worse. But if we just tell him not to–”

_:Good luck with that. Girl, if he wakes up confused and in this much pain, he will flail around and use his Gifts instinctively. Seen it a thousand times: _

“What do we do?” Dara had three doses of a strong sleeping-draught in her kit, but no more, and even that might not be enough to knock Vanyel out entirely.

A sigh._ :I can use my Healing to keep him unconscious for a while: _

“You can do that?”

_:I’ve been doing it already. He’d be thrashing around screaming right now, otherwise: _

“Oh.”

_:You’re welcome: _Need added. _:Can’t say I’m happy about it, it won’t be very good for him physically or mentally, really not recommended, and it’s rather tedious to maintain. You’ll need to keep me with him constantly and I won’t be good for much else. Fortunately I don’t need to sleep: _

“Sorry.” Dara yawned. “How long?”

A frustrated grunt. _:Don’t hold me to it, but I’d guess two to three weeks: _

“Three _weeks_?” Dara said, feeling her jaw go slack.

_:Are you deaf? That’s what I said: _Need grumbled. _:Don’t know what you think I am, but it’s going to take a lot of work to repair this much damage: _

“I believe you,” Dara said faintly. “Just…” Three weeks from now, they would already be running out of food.

_:We’ll do our best: _Need grumbled. _:That’s one of the risks, but it’s safer than the alternative:_

* * *

Stef slid down the wall, panting.

“Jisa wins that one,” Medren said dully. He looked almost as drained as Stef felt – apparently, being made to intensely feel a series of emotions was as tiring as projecting them.

Stef had been expecting it. He had given it a good, solid try, but Jisa was _remarkably _good at righteous anger. He didn’t know where it had come from – that bottomless, fiery rage, and he had found himself wanting to get up and stand by her side, brandishing his weapons and his Gifts, to rip down whoever or whatever had had the indecency to wrong her.

If he had gone second, he thought, he might have been able to win it. _I didn’t know I was capable of feeling so angry. _Like lifting the lid to some bottomless well, and he wasn’t sure how to feel about it.

At least he had won ‘amusement’ – it was cheating, a bit, because he was a _lot _more familiar with Medren’s sense of humour, and his Gift privileged telling a story. He had picked a bawdy, ridiculous song with very clever wordplay, which he knew Medren liked, and he hadn’t tried to push the emotion directly, so much as pull Medren into the tale and let his reaction happen naturally. The concept of feeling amused but not _about _anything specific was a weird one.

“Let’s get this over with,” Medren added, reaching for the coin.

Damn. Stef had expected he would need a break again. _I hope I go second. _He had gone first on ‘amusement’ again, but second on ‘anger’ – the longer break had been helpful, but it meant he risked going twice in a row.

The coin landed.

“Jisa,” Medren said.

_Oh thank god. _He could at least take a moment to rest.

She stood up, bouncing on her heels – her face was flushed in the candlelight, hair wetted down to her forehead with sweat, and she was breathing hard, but she didn’t otherwise look tired.

She just stood there for a moment, eyes downcast, arms at her sides, and then she looked up, and the wave hit.

_– it was the darkness under the bed – it was the monster lurking in the shadows – it was the thing you never saw, couldn’t look at, if you didn’t look then it wouldn’t see you – it was everything wrong under the surface, a yawning gulf too wide to bridge – it was the world coming to pieces and nothing to be done –_

Stef found himself on the floor, curled into a ball. He wasn’t, quite, in tears, but he was close to it, for the first time in years. That had been _intense. _

Medren was uncurling as well, pale and shaken. “Very impressive,” he said weakly. “I’m sleeping with a candle lit tonight, that’s for sure. Stef, your turn.”

Stef, still trembling, stood. His mind had gone entirely blank – he couldn’t think of a song at all.

Shadow Stalker? No, that was much more about despair, not fear, and it ended happily. Neither was the damned Shadow-Lover song, which was the other thing that kept coming to mind – and that wasn’t even a song he _liked_. Making death sound romantic had always struck him as horrifying and wrong.

He was very cold, and he felt off-balance, almost confused. Like he couldn’t entirely remember where he was – like he had put so much of himself into the songs that he couldn’t remember _who _he was. All he knew was that something was wrong. With the Kingdom; with everything.

With him.

A flash of memory; standing with his hand on the Web-focus. _Stef? _

It didn’t make sense, and that was the worst part.

“Stef, I’m counting,” he heard Medren say. “One, two, three…”

Think. What was he afraid of?

_Dying alone. _

…Was that true? It wasn’t like he had ever really thought about it before.

There was a song on his lips now.

He didn’t even try to play the lute; his hands were shaking too hard.

_Shadow-Lover, never seen by day,_

_Only deep in dreams do you appear_

_Wisdom tells me I should turn away,_

_Love of mist and shadows, all unclear--_

_Nothing can I hold of you but thought_

_Shadow-Lover mist and twilight wrought._

It was the bottomless pit of not-knowing, of everything that he couldn’t control. It was seeing the signs that something he had taken for granted was starting to crumble, and there was no path forward, no way to find safety again, it was intolerable and impossible and there was no way out.

_Shadow-Lover, you alone can know_

_How I long to reach a point of peace_

_How I fade with weariness and woe_

_How I long for you to bring release._

_Shadow-Lover, court me in my dreams_

_Bring the peace that suffering redeems._

It was the fear that at the end of it all, it wouldn’t be enough, he would fail and he would die alone, knowing he had failed, as the world fell apart around him. The words of the song were a lie, a paper-thin shield pasted over the abyss of everything that could go wrong – and Stef sang them anyway, because that lie was part of it as well. Looking away, pretending that things were all right when they weren’t, and that was how it all ended.

It was the nightmare that no one saw coming, the mistakes that were caught too late – but soon enough that he would see his own death ahead, and know that he was to blame for the loss of everything that had ever mattered–

The song trailed off.

Stef sank to his knees, blinking away the spots that danced in his vision. He saw that Medren and Jisa were clinging to each other in the corner.

The Work Room suddenly felt very dark, despite the cheerful flickering candlelight, and very claustrophobic.

“…Stef?”

_Where did that come from? _

“Stef?” Jisa, sounding very worried. “Are you all right?”

“I’m fine.” He wasn’t – he felt like the center of him had fallen out, and the rest of him was still falling. “Are _you_ all right?”

“I think you win that one, Stef.” Medren’s voice was unsteady, and he was leaning with his head fallen back against the wall, like he couldn’t hold it up anymore. “That was…wow.”

“So we’re tied?” Stef tried to put a bit of challenge into his voice, a bravado that he certainly wasn’t feeling; he was having a hard time getting enough air into his lungs. “Aww, come on, we need a tiebrea–”

“No.” Medren didn’t say it loudly, but he didn’t need to. “I’m done. And I’m never doing this again.” He dragged a hand over his face. “Don’t know what I was thinking.”

“Stef,” Jisa interrupted. “Your mind is doing something funny. Are you sure you’re all right?”

“Jisa!” Stef flung up his arms over his face. “I didn’t say you could read my mind!”

“I wasn’t reading your _thoughts, _it was just my other Sight–”

“Well, stop it!” he barked, with more heat than he’d intended. “I’m going outside.” He hauled himself to his feet, clamping his hands together in front of him so Jisa wouldn’t see them shaking. The walls seemed to press down on him, crushing, and he felt far too hot. _I need air. _

The damned door was locked, and he struggled to unlatch it. Jisa reached in after a moment, helping, and he almost slapped her hand away, but made himself relax.

The cool fresh night air, smelling of the first hints of autumn, helped, but Stef was still dizzy. The stars shone in the sky, bright, distant. He slumped against the outer wall, chest heaving, taking in deep gulps.

Jisa drifted up to him, and took his hand, without saying anything. Stef let her. As long as she didn’t ask, he was glad to have her there.

If she _did _ask, he didn’t even know what to tell her. Jisa was probably going to think that something horrible and traumatic had happened to him, that he had been reliving and pulling them into,and she would want to hear the story behind it, but he had nothing for her. _I don’t know where that came from either._

* * *

They met for a hurried conference in the corner of the main vault-room – which was starting to smell, with no one to maintain the air-barrier over the bucket of sand and Companion-manure. For lack of a better place, Dara had been relieving herself there as well.

She had just finished getting Vanyel cleaned up, with Karna’s help to turn him. Need had pointed out it was a good sign he was wetting the bed now. _He’s getting enough fluids in to be pissing at all. _That hadn’t made Dara feel any better about it.

Much as it was frustrating, flopping his deadweight around, she was very glad that he was unconscious. Poor Vanyel would have been mortified by all of this, and the last thing Dara felt like doing was navigating his feelings on top of everything else.

_This is why I’m not a Healer, _she had told Need, when the sword mocked her for her squeamishness, claiming that this wasn’t even very bad.

Karna still seemed to be taking all of this with remarkable calm, Dara thought. They hadn’t really talked about it, even though it had been nearly two days now.

“Karna,” she said. “I talked to Rolan again, and…” No, she had to say it, it was worse to put it off. “And we’re on our own.”

Karna bowed her head. “I did not expect otherwise.”

The complete lack of emotion in her voice hurt worse than tears. “Vel’asha walked the Moonpaths,” Dara added, almost pleadingly, and she wasn’t sure who she was pleading to. “She asked her _leshy’a Kal’enedral _for permission to help us, and they said no. They can’t risk compromising the defences on this place, if Ma’ar lives – and it’s very unlikely help could reach us in time to make any difference, even if Rolan was able to bring every Herald-Mage in Valdemar here.” Which, he hadn’t needed to point out, would leave Valdemar stripped bare, and there just wasn’t enough node-energy in Ka'venusho to carve a tunnel through fused rock very fast even with magic.

Dara had, very briefly, considered asking Rolan if Savil might be able to do it with blood-power. That was how Leareth had made his pass in the north, maybe it would be fast enough – unlike node-energy, people were transportable – and surely _someone _would volunteer, if it meant saving Vanyel… But she couldn’t bring herself to say that to him, and hear his reaction.

Trying it without the permission of the Shin’a’in was suicide, anyway, and there was no way their Goddess would approve it.

“You could try to ask the _lesh’ya Kal’enedral _as well?” Dara said. One last hope…

Karna only shook her head. “I have tried. I cannot reach the Moonpaths here. Perhaps one with the full training of a shaman could, but it seems I need the moon in the sky.”

Oh. Dara…wasn’t sure that actually made any sense. _Surely the Goddess is everywhere. _She didn’t know how to argue with it, though.

So Vel’asha’s decision was final.

It felt very unfair to her, and wrong. Vanyel was the only chance any of them had of defeating Leareth. Didn’t the shaman realize that she might be dooming her own people as well, by refusing to help them?

–But if he died down here, or lost the use of his Gifts, then they were doomed anyway. It wouldn’t be _that _much worse for Valdemar to lose a young, half-trained King’s Own as well. Rolan, thank the gods, was safe. He would go back, he would Choose again, and he knew everything that they had learned in Kata’shin’a’in, and would know everything they could discover in the Tower before their time ran out. He could bring that to Randi.

Vanyel would live or die in the next few weeks, before help had any chance of reaching them.

“Rolan did have a thought,” Dara went on. “Need doesn’t know how to Gate, and we don’t know if it’s possible for her to learn, but it might be. Rolan doesn’t know the full instructions for the spell, he hasn’t ever been bonded to a Herald-Mage–” which was weird, really, mages hadn’t been _that _rare until the last few years, ”–but he told me the basics, and maybe Need can figure it out from there.”

Karna inclined her head. “It is said that Urtho was the greatest master of what you call Gates. Perhaps there are further instructions in his diaries.”

“Oh! That’s a good thought!” The hope that rose was almost painful. “I mean, Urtho must have known all sorts of magic we don’t. There could be something else, some other forgotten technique that could help us. One of his artifacts, maybe…”

“Perhaps,” Karna allowed. “If you are in agreement, I will continue my translation of his journals.” Her eyelids lowered for a moment. “If we are to die here, I would like my people to gain something for it. You can reach your Rolan… Perhaps you might recount to him what we learn, and he might tell my fellows, that it can be recorded for our descendants.”

She shouldn’t have been talking about it so calmly. Dara had to fight back tears every time she thought about dying down here, never seeing the sun again.

_:Don’t be maudlin, child: _Need sent. _:I have no intention of being stuck here forever: _

Dara took a deep breath, and squared her shoulders, lifting her chin. “It’s going to be cutting it close,” she said, “because Need won’t be able to practice until Vanyel is stable enough that she can leave him for a bit. If that takes three weeks, we might already be out of food. And we can’t actually get Vanyel _out _through a Gate, if he’s still in a bad way – I kind of forgot, but he’s incredibly sensitive to Gates, and even if he wasn’t, Need said that taking any mage through a Gate when their channels are damaged is a bad idea.”

“We might still bring in help and supplies,” Karna pointed out.

“That’s sort of a plan, then. I can help you a bit with the translation, when I’m not busy helping Need with Vanyel. We’ve got water, we’ve got food for a while – we can manage.”


	20. Chapter Twenty

He drifted.

It wasn’t really sleep, and he didn’t really dream. He didn’t remember his own name. Most of the time, there was nothing at all.

Time passed, and it barely touched him.

Sometimes the surface was closer, and there was pain in the distance, but it didn’t matter. He floated far below it. 

Sometimes there were sounds and colours and sensations, but they were happening a long way away. Not to him.

Sometimes, rarely, he surfaced enough for thoughts to form.

Something was wrong.

_Where am I? _

Something he was supposed to be doing…

_‘Lendel, where…?_

He couldn’t remember where ‘Lendel was, and he should have been able to remember. Should have been able to feel him, no matter what.

But the darkness would claim him again, and he would slide away from the pain. Away from everything.

* * *

_:Focus, girl: _Need grumbled. _:Give him some water next: _

“I know, I know.” Dara adjusted Vanyel’s limp weight in her lap. “Are we almost done?”

_:You have no patience: _

Dara thought that was unfair. She had made a lot of progress when it came to patience, in the last ten days, each of them marked in charcoal on the wall. She had wondered if someone, someday, would find their skeletons down here, and wonder what those strokes on the stone had been counting… _Don’t be morbid, _she told herself firmly.

On the bright side, Vanyel’s physical injuries were healing well. On the downside, they were feeding him, and what went in had to come out. Dara had never really thought it through, what Healers had to put up with. If they got out of this alive, she was going to give every single Healer in Haven a hug and bring them flowers, just for sheer gratitude that she wouldn’t need to wash soiled sheets in a horse-trough _ever ever again. _

If she survived this, she was never going underground again. Or into any buildings, possibly. She would be one of those strange hermits who only slept out under the stars.

Out of contact with Rolan most of the time, she could feel the bond with Need, different from her bond with her Companion. It was…nice. Strange, but nice. Need wasn’t exactly supportive, she was cranky and impatient and often insufferable, but she was _there_. Dara was glad of it. Otherwise the loneliness might have been driving her mad.

_:You’re not going to go mad: _Need muttered. _:I won’t stand for it: _

Dara cupped Vanyel’s chin with one hand, and lifted a spoonful of water to his lips. “That’s it, good…” It was silly to talk to him, he couldn’t hear her, but it felt weirder not to. 

Maybe after this, there would be time to go to the top of the stairs and try to reach Rolan. Dara went at least once a day, and more when Need could spare her. She missed him. Not desperately, it was surprisingly bearable – until the thought came back that maybe she would never touch him again, and then she would usually cry.

_:You’re daydreaming, girl: _Need snapped in her head.

“Dara?”

She looked up. “Karna, what is it?”

The Scrollsworn settled easily into a cross-legged position. She was noticeably thinner; they had been eating only one real meal a day, to save time and Need’s energy as much as anything else, the pease and various grains were time-consuming to cook and they had no way of heating water except for Need to use magic. Which, in the end, usually came from Dara’s reserves, because there wasn’t much ambient energy. Whatever powered the mage-lights, Need couldn’t get at it. There was a pile of artifacts in the empty Work Room, and maybe one of them was for cooking food, but Need had been occupied and hadn’t examined them yet, and Dara certainly couldn’t make heads or tails of what they did. She hadn’t tried very hard – she was, honestly, terrified that one of them would explode if she touched it.

At least the power-source for the lights still worked. Dara didn’t even want to think about doing all of this in pitch blackness.

Karna laid a scroll flat on the stone floor, weighing it down with two of their travel-cups. “I have found something that might interest you.”

“Oh?”

Dara felt Need’s gusty mental sigh in her head. _:I see you’re thoroughly distracted. Enough for now, but get him comfy before you wander off: _

“Karna, I’ll be there in minute,” Dara said quickly. She extracted Vanyel from her lap and laid him down, arranging his limbs in what she hoped was a comfortable position, dragging the blanket over him. His bedroll stank already.

_:You’re doing a very good job: _Need sent, and for once her mindvoice was gentle, and sincere.

It was the least she could do, really – Vanyel had nearly died trying to shield her, she owed it to him to care for him as patiently as she could, even if it wasn’t one of her strengths. Still, the rare praise brought a glow to her chest.

“Karna?” she said, shuffling over. “I can look now.”

“This entry dates from about ten years before the Cataclysm,” Karna said. “It is the first mention of Ma’ar that I have found, though of course it may not be the first chronologically, as I am still putting these surviving notes in order.” She paused. “I found a letter folded between the pages. It is not written in the Kaled’a’in language, and I cannot translate it, but I have copied the text over exactly. If we are ever able to leave this place, you might search for a scholar who recognizes the tongue.”

Her voice was flat. _She doesn’t think we’re going to make it out. _

“I gather that the letter is addressed to Urtho,” Karna went on, “and is from Ma’ar, in his own hand.”

Dara felt her jaw go slack. “That’s incredible.”

A faint smile. “Yes.”

Dara leaned forward, resting her knees on her elbows. “Go on, then.”

_Adept Kiyamvir Ma’ar has done well for himself in recent years. He writes to me of his studies and his discoveries, and perhaps he hopes I will be proud. I am. _

_However, there are things he does not lay on the page, that perhaps have gone unsaid between us too long. I must warn him that he treads a dangerous path, and that here in Tantara, we speak of his rise to power in hushed and worried tones. _

_Perhaps he knows this, and sees it as no obstacle. _

_It is an error of youth. There is a lesson I learned in my time, one he is too young to have witnessed, and yet he must learn it, or be doomed to repeat the mistakes of history. We must not return to our past of mage-warlords and tyranny. It has been tried and found lacking, and perhaps that is what Ma’ar does not yet see. _

_It would be a tragedy, to watch my best and brightest student become merely a weapon in the hands of a despot King, but I fear even worse. The taste of power corrupts, that is what our history teaches, and I will not let a century of progress be rolled back by one man. _

_Yet he carries a rare spark, and I wish not to see that quashed. So many mages turn to the dark because they care too little for their fellow man, and seek glory only in their own advancement. Ma’ar is not one of them. I remember an obstinate young man who screamed at his own teacher, that I would not disobey my King’s orders to intervene in the north. One might call it impertinence, even defiance, but I call it resolve. _

_He is not wrong that we live in difficult times, and resolve is needed. And yet balance is needed as well, and this is what the young always struggle to see. _

_If Ma’ar is lost to darkness, it will be not because he cares too little, but because he cares too much. Yet I fear it would not matter, in the end, and he would be lost all the same. _

Karna stopped reading, and folded her hands in her lap. “That is all Urtho wrote, on that day. We may deduce that he sent a reply, but he did not hold onto a copy.”

Of course not – most people wouldn’t keep copies of letters they sent to acquaintances.

“I am not sure of the translation,” Karna went on. “Particularly in those adjectives he uses to describe Ma’ar – the associations of a word may shift greatly over time, even if the core meaning does not. The word I translate as ‘obstinate’ is one I have not seen before, and I am guessing from the root.”

Dara nodded. “Of course. I understand the limitations.” She tried to smile, even though her mind was still spinning over the contents of the diary-entry. “Did you learn anything else useful?”

“Of immediate use? No. Every line is of great historical interest to my people, of course, and I have learned much of Urtho’s affections towards his students, and a surprising amount about the medical problems of gryphons – but I have seen no mention of Gates.” She shook her head. “They are personal diaries, not spell-research, but it seems they do span many years. Urtho was a man who wrote a great deal.” 

“I’d like to read the rest, if that’s all right,” Dara said. It would be a way to pass the time.

And she found Urtho utterly fascinating. Larger than life, a figure out of tales…

She wondered if he and Vanyel would have gotten along. It seemed likely.

The snippets about Ma’ar were still echoing around in her head.

_He carries a rare spark, and I would not want to see that quashed._

_If Ma’ar is lost to darkness, it will be not because he cares too little, but because he cares too much._

That sounded, well, significantly more compatible with the Leareth that Vanyel had seen.

* * *

“What is it?” Shavri said, standing in the doorway to Savil’s quarters, weariness in her voice.

“Sorry to bother you.” Savil was sitting at her tiny table, papers spread out in front of her, a cup of half-drunk watered wine acting as a paperweight. “Just wanted to talk you through some of my thoughts. You’re the best I have for it.” Second to Vanyel, who wasn’t here. _Damn it, ke’chara, I miss you. _Nearly six months that he and Dara had been gone, and there had been no news at all.

Shavri closed the door, and moved over. “Thoughts on what?”

“I might’ve made some progress on understanding permanent Gates, finally.” Incomplete, she would have to work backwards to figure out the steps to build one, but it was a _lot _closer than before.

Shavri pulled over a chair and joined her. “This is from those books from the Eastern Empire.”

“Yes.”

The more she had learned, from the bits and pieces that Natti let slip, the more amazed she was that Parva Ermane and his wife had ever made it out of the Empire, much less escaped with what had to be tight-held secrets. Over there, it was common practice for mages – and anyone sworn to the Emperor – to have their loyalty enforced by compulsion-spells. It wasn’t even considered corrupt; mages would submit to it voluntarily in order to reach positions of higher prestige. Using compulsions outside the Emperor’s hierarchy_ was _illegal, but it was an open secret that nobles and landholders would try to suborn each others’ vassals without being caught. Savil had the impression that the capital was a nest of snakes, a dozen factions and conspiracies wrestling for influence – but, in the end, the Emperor had a kind of ultimate control that she couldn’t imagine.

The Emperors were nearly always Adept-class mages, with retinues of other mages bound to them. They were long-lived, thanks to heavy use of magic; two hundred years wasn’t uncommon. The Empire was huge, dwarfing Valdemar, and entirely centralized. Natti had never heard of the various Mind-Gifts, so they were either absent or the Empire lacked training for them, but they had scrying, communication-spells, and Gates – though Natti called them ‘Portals’ – all of which were used for instantaneous communication and for transportation of goods and people. Allowing the Emperor to rule even that vast territory with an iron fist.

The inhabitants of the capital city, Jacona, would be starving within a week if the Portal network went down, Natti had said.

They had formal protocols for the use of blood-magic.

It was all bizarre. Food for thought, given that she now knew who had been responsible for the Empire’s founding.

“Savil?” Shavri said.

“Oh. Sorry.” She rubbed her forehead. “Woolgathering. Listen – what does this look like to you?”

Shavri leaned forward, one finger falling to explore the diagram, and Savil sipped her wine and waited.

"It looks like a Gate-archway," Shavri said finally. "With...what's this?"

"That's what I'm not sure of." It was an odd sort of diagram; Kilchas said it reminded him of the way an architect would plan a building, showing some sections with the setup 'exploded' and dissembled, with arrows pointing where the parts would fit together. "This is all internal magical structure, not physical – I'm pretty sure that's what it means when the notation is in blue ink instead of black. First off, the archway is 'primed' for Gate-energies, using something like the ritual the Tayledras have for preparing a terminus." Maybe even similar enough that she could just substitute that spell, rather than trying to figure it out from the scanty notes in the text. "And then something like a shield is applied, forming a shaped container for mage-energies; if any flow of energy is applied, even with minimal control by the mage, the archway will sort of soak it up and become a Gate-threshold.”

She tapped the diamond-shape at the top of the archway. "That's a large mage-focus of some kind. Can't tell what type of crystal it wants, but I would start off with quartz, it's the most neutral." A box and a line showed a zoomed-in drawing of the focus. "I'm not totally sure what it's for. But I think it's a sort of keystone, that holds the whole thing stable once it's powered." She paused. "And the whole thing needs a power-source, but I can't figure out where they're keeping it!"

"Why?" Shavri said.

"Because supposedly, once this thing is built, activating it – raising a Gate from one point in the network to another – is apprentice-work. Meaning there can't be much of an energy-draw on the mage in question, and it doesn't need to be re-powered by a stronger mage between uses, so it must be replenishing power from somewhere else."

"Like a node?"

"Possibly, but it's not supposed to be possible to set up a direct link between an artifact and a node, without a mage in the middle. The energy is too wild – you need something intelligent in control of it." Savil stroked the tip of her nose. “Unless you have a Heartstone. But there's no way they're building a tiny Heartstone under ever single permanent Gate-threshold."

"Why not?"

_Because building one supposedly requires a piece of the Star-Eyed Goddess, and there's no way She would give bits of herself to a place like the Eastern Empire. _It couldn't be more antithetical to everything the Tayledras stood for, which Savil had to assume was a proxy for their Goddess' values, if it made sense to say that gods and goddesses had values.

Not something she wanted to think about, right now – it brushed too close to what Leareth might talk about with Vanyel.

"They're a major undertaking," she said instead. "And I don't know that anyone outside the Tayledras ever knew how to build them. So I'm not sure how they do it." She reached to shift the papers. “There was this other page, but I’m not actually sure it’s part of the Gate. I don’t know what all their words mean yet.” She had a list of guessed-at translations from Natti, somewhere in her mess of notes, but she had to admit she was going half on intuition.

“Looks like a beehive,” Shavri said. “Or a funnel. What does it do?”

“Who knows?” Savil stared vaguely into the distance. _Maybe Leareth knows. _

There was a horrifying possibility she hadn’t considered. What if Leareth had Gate-termini in Valdemar? Maybe he couldn’t bring an army through, but to transport spies–

He couldn’t do it without being detected, she reminded herself. Even before the new Web, Gate-energies would have been obvious, and now the _vrondi _would call an alarm in about half a second, and they would at least be forewarned. It was possible he had a permanent Gate threshold somewhere, but even so he couldn’t use it without giving away the location. And it was unclear if he could have built it in secret – according to the textbook, creating the terminus was a major undertaking, that required the attention of multiple Adepts and would release considerable energy. Not exactly discreet.

“There’s another thing I’m confused about,” she added. “There’s a mention of mages needing to be ‘keyed in’ to the network – it sounds almost like some kind of security. I’m not sure how it would work, though.”

Again, she desperately wished for Vanyel’s advice. He would probably have a dozen ideas – and even if half of them were originally Leareth’s, well, maybe that was exactly the edge they needed. Intimate knowledge of how their enemy thought.

_If he’s our enemy at all. _

She had tried her best to do as Vanyel asked, sitting down and thinking about the situation, but it was hard – her mind still bounced away from it. Less screaming in horror, now, and more helpless confusion. It was too big. Too bizarre. It still felt half-unreal.

Oddly, she had never thought of asking Shavri if they could talk about it. Which, come to think of it, wasn’t a bad idea. Shavri wasn’t a mage, or a Herald, but neither of those was really the point, and she was clever. She had flashes of the same creativity and flexibility-of-thought that Vanyel did. _Just look at her Healing research. _

She started to open her mouth, and then closed it. _I don’t have the courage yet. _

“Hmm.” Shavri was clearly deep in thought. “Does it recognize the person, like the Web? Or do they just need to know some kind of pass-phrase?”

“I don’t know.” It was a good question. “Here, I’ve got the notes on it somewhere…”

* * *

_Excerpts from the diaries of Urtho, the Mage of Silence_

_Translated by Karna shena Tale'sedrin_

_Kal’enedral and Scrollsworn to Kata’shin’a’in_

**Autumn, circa 25 years before the Cataclysm **

_It is not often that I meet a student who leaves me both awed and frightened. _

_This time, his name is Kiyamvir Ma’ar. He is a boy of fifteen, old to be only starting his training in mage-craft, and he does not speak the Tantaran or the Kata’shin’a’in languages, we have only trade-pidgin in common. Two challenges that I face. He is of Predain, to the north, born to one of their nomadic tribes. They are not much like my peaceful Kaled’a’in; his are a violent people, and I fear he has seen much horror and heartbreak in his short life. _

_He will not speak of it to me. I suppose I have not yet earned his trust. I am not sure that anyone has his trust, and it is a sad thing to observe. He seems the most entirely self-reliant child I have ever encountered, and I am not sure that he calls anybody friend. _

_It is not true that he has had no training. Despite his youth, he served a mage-warlord for some years before he came to us. His skills and potential were sadly under-utilized; he tells me he was a petty clerk, and kept the ledgers and records. At least he is literate, and knows his numbers and figuring well. I am sure he was very good at the job, but nonetheless, what a terrible waste of a brilliant mind. _

_He is intelligent, that much is clear, and I have rarely seen such drive. I think he will catch up with his classmates with no trouble, and perhaps far exceed them. There is a spark in him, a strength of ambition I have missed in so many others. He will let nothing hold him back. _

_Perhaps there is a desperation in it. A thirst, not only for knowledge, but for power. Control. This is what frightens me. We know from our past that this thirst for power is what leads so inexorably down the path of darkness. _

_He seeks to protect others who are vulnerable, and this does assuage my worry somewhat, though I hope he will learn to do it in a way that does not violate our customs so. I will not tolerate fights amongst my students. _

_He does not feel safe here, and it pains me. No one need sleep with a weapon under their pillow, here in Ka’venusho, and yet I suppose he is not yet ready to believe that. _

_Yet he did seek me out, and ask if I would be his teacher. I will not turn any student away, and I will do my best to guide him down the path of light. _

**Winter, circa 22 years before the Cataclysm**

_Young Ma’ar is my pride and joy, and yet I swear that he will be the death of me. _

_He considers nothing sacred. One might think this uncharitable of me, but I asked him and he agreed! He will say it is a concept that does not make sense, that there is only the world, the cold logic and laws on which it turns, and the lives of the people in it. He has no respect for the gods. I do not know what to say to him on this; I am no shaman, to counsel youngsters in theology. Perhaps I ought send him to one of the shamans, that they might offer the advice I cannot, but I fear he might offend them deeply. _

_We spoke in our seminar today of compulsions, and why this is dark magic. Ma’ar, as always, is of the opinion that ‘dark’ and ‘light’ are not coherent concepts, and that we must look only to results. He listed twenty ways that one might use a compulsion, in and off the battlefield, to save lives and improve the situation of people. As usual, his fellow students struggle to find the flaws in his logic, though the conclusions are monstrous, and so it devolves into name-calling from which I must rescue him. _

_At least it is not so bad as the incident of the blood-magic debate. I encourage debate among the young scholars, it is a way to stretch our minds, but Ma’ar debates as though he is fighting for his life. I thought it might be an interesting exercise to debate the potential merits of blood-magic, in the abstract of course; I should have predicted that Ma’ar would take it entirely too seriously. _

_And then, of course, there is the search for immortality. Ma’ar is hardly the first youngster to seek out a fountain of youth, and perhaps his naivety will fade with the years – and yet, there is something different in his approach. Others have told me that he speaks to them of dark magics that prolong life. There is still a desperation in him, it seems, and for more than power alone. Death is a part of the natural order, and yet he would defy it, and I know him well; he would call that defiance good and right. _

_Nonetheless, it is a pleasure when he comes to my office. His mind is so quick, and he places no limits on his thoughts. It has been a very long time since I have felt challenged by one so young. _

_I would like to invite Ma’ar to my next salon, though he is only eighteen winters; he is the equal of many of my Adepts already, though he falls behind in concert-work. Trusting in the work of others is still a struggle for him. A weakness that I hope I may help him remedy. After all, Great Workings are the most transformative innovation of our recent age. _

_I hope also that he will learn to make friends. He spends little effort on those small courtesies that would smooth his way, and it will not make his life easy if he continues to baffle and offend his classmates as he does now. I think he is coming to understand this, and perhaps making efforts in this direction, but of course he thinks of it in his usual frame, in terms of allies and power. I wish he would see the value, not simply in trading favours, but in loyal friends. There is a wound in him still, I think. I look at him, and I see a young man who is desperately lonely, and yet does not know there is any other way to live. _

**Spring, circa 17 years before the Cataclysm**

_I will not ask any to stay in my Tower who is not willing, and so young Adept Kiyamvir Ma’ar has left us today, and returned to his homeland._

_He would be happier here, I think, among his fellow scholars, those who see and respect his mind for what it is, but he has always been ambitious. Learning is not enough for him; he wishes to take it out into the world, and transform it. _

_An admirable desire, and a dangerous one. I worry less for him now than I did once; there is a darkness in him, but there is great light as well, and in the end none of us can claim to be free of darkness and base desires. _

_Nonetheless, out in the world, he will be tempted. Unscrupulous men will offer him great reward in exchange for his power. The desire for power and control over so much more than just magic is a weakness in his spirit, and one that I was never able to convince him was a flaw. _

_I will miss him dearly. He has been a pleasure in my advanced classes and seminars, in recent years – he speaks so well, he is relentlessly curious, and he has learned to be attentive to the feelings of others. I thought the day would never come! Occasionally he will say something shocking, but we are all used to it by now; we know it is his way, and part of his charm. I would not describe him as popular, exactly, but he is respected. It would be difficult not to respect his skill, when he exceeds many Adepts three times his age. _

_I remember the last conversation that we shared, here in this office. I told him yet again that it would please me for him to stay, continue his studies, and teach as he was taught. I reminded him of all we have to offer here in Ka’venusho, and he said that is why he must leave. Because Tantara flourishes, and so that is not where he is needed. _

_He tells me that these are dark times outside of my Kingdom, and I cannot say he is wrong. There has been trouble on our borders for a long time. I know this, and yet, I am Archmage to Tantara, not to the world. I would not wish it to be otherwise; it would be entirely too much power to risk placing in the hands of one man. _

_I think that Ma’ar looks down on me for this, and I cannot yet explain why that is a mistake; he is still too young, too full of fire, he is not yet tempered by failure and defeat. Some things cannot be taught, only learned for oneself. Someday, perhaps, we will sit down for a drink together, as equals, and he will tell me he understands what I have tried to say to him all along._

* * *

Three weeks and three days. That was how long it had been.

Dara sat with her back against the stone, kneading Vanyel’s limp hand between her thumbs. His burns were just about healed now, the last of the scabs were flaking off and peeling to reveal pink, new skin, but Need said they needed to work on stretching the scarred tissue if he was to have full range of motion in his fingers.

The scarring wasn’t pretty, but it wasn’t as horrifying as she had expected either. Vanyel’s little bit of Healing-Gift was helping them out, Need said, and given enough time it would fade almost entirely. Like Tran’s old burn-scars, hardly noticeable except in particular lighting. He had seemed self-conscious about it, but Dara hadn’t minded at all. If anything, it only made him more interestingly attractive.

Tran had told her the story of how he had been injured, at some point during that long, long afternoon, still a rosy-edged glow in her memory. Damn it but she missed him. When she got back to Haven – if they ever made it out alive – she wasn’t sure she would be able to stop herself from slamming him into a wall and kissing him senseless, no matter how bad an idea it was.

She probably ought to get up at some point, and climb the knotted rope to go refill their waterskins in the well-room, but her limbs felt heavy, and it seemed like a very long way.

She had stopped feeling hungry, like her stomach had given up on it, but the fatigue never left her now. Lately she got dizzy when she stood up and her vision would darken at the edges, especially if Need had been doing magic lately and draining her energy. She felt cold all the time, and she was spending a lot of time sleeping, or at least in a half-trance, half-stupor, fantasizing about beef-roast with drippings and fresh-baked bread drenched in butter.

They had fallen into a routine that was comfortable enough. Karna worked on her translation of Urtho’s texts, washed dirty blankets, and cooked from their meagre stores. Dara did just about everything else.

She had done a little more exploring, by candlelight, but not much; she wanted to wait until Need could be with her to warn her if something was about to explode in her face. It wasn’t like they were going to find food that was still good, anyway, and right now Dara found it hard to be excited about anything else.

At least digging through a pile of debris in one half-collapsed side room that she and Vanyel had already checked before had turned up a few more mysterious artifacts, and something much, much better. A jar of sea-salt. Lukewarm water with salt dissolved in it would have sounded like the worst thing in the world, before, but it was _sort _of like soup, and Dara found it oddly comforting.

She still made her way up the stairs whenever she had the energy, to talk to Rolan – in the end, no one had gone back to Valdemar to pass a message, it wasn’t like Randi could actually do anything to help them. Yfandes didn’t want to leave the vicinity of the Tower, and Dara badly didn’t want Rolan to go either. _I need him or I really will lose my mind. _

He told her that he had supplies ready at the surface, if they were able to set up a Gate. Dara hadn’t thought to wonder until later how he had arranged that – had he used Mindspeech directly with the other Shin’a’in? At least it was probably easier for them to believe he was a person and not just a horse. _They’re used to uncanny things. _

It had been three days since the last time she had gone up the stairs. She missed him, but it had faded to a dull ache, those stairs were _steep_, and she didn’t feel like using up all her energy on pushing Mindspeech through rock.

Probably she ought to force herself to go some point, or he would worry, but she found she couldn’t care very much. It wasn’t like there was anything new to tell him.

The sacks of grain and pease had lasted longer than expected – maybe because pease-porridge was so goddamned boring, she was never very excited about it even when she was hungry – and there was still some left, but they had run out of dried meat five days ago, and Dara felt the difference. At this rate, soon she wouldn’t be strong enough to climb the damned rope. Well, they did have the floating barge, and they had rigged the ropes into a makeshift pulley-system, so that one person could pull themselves up or down.

They had figured out a few more tricks with the ceiling mage-lights, as well. They never turned them off entirely, but Karna had played around and found a command that would dim them to a warm, sunset-y light that was much better for sleeping.

Right now was about their ‘midday’, and the lights were blazing brightly. Dara preferred it like that when she was awake; it made her feel much less claustrophobic.

Vanyel had lost a lot of weight – Dara had been trying hard, it felt like she spent candlemarks a day feeding him, but oat-mush with broth didn’t really contain all the nourishment he needed. His skin had a sallow, yellowish tint, and his hair, already half singed off by the blast, had started falling out in chunks. Not to mention that they had no way to really wash it, and it had ended up utterly disgusting. Dara, fed up with bits of it getting stuck to his burns when she changed the bandages, had eventually got out her belt-knife and hacked most of it off.

Vanyel was probably going to murder her for that, when he woke up.

But he was going to wake up. Need said his Gift-channels were almost healed enough, but she had been saying that for days, and Dara was dubious.

_:You have so little faith in me: _Need complained in her mind. _:I was thinking we might try letting him wake up today, actually: _

“…Really?” Dara probably should have been feeling something. Excitement, or trepidation, or hope, or at least curiosity.

_:Really. You should do everything else that needs doing first: _

“Why?”

A wry chuckle. _:Because this won’t be much fun for either of us, but especially not for him. It’s not good for a mind to be kept unconscious by magic for a month. He’s going to be coming out of it very disoriented, and still hurting: _

“I could give him some painkillers first.” She didn’t have anything very strong, and she hadn’t bothered before. She hadn’t been giving him his herbs either. It didn’t seem like there was much point, and she thought they might as well save the limited quantity they had.

_:Hmm. I approve of that plan: _

It took about a candlemark before everything was done. Dara had made three trips up and down, taking breaks often to catch her breath and wait for the lightheadedness to pass, eventually refilling the water-trough and all of their waterskins. She had bathed Vanyel as well as she could. _He would hate to wake up filthy. _Not that anything down here was clean anymore, exactly. Pretty much every item of cloth they had was stained with something or other; without soap, even hot water wasn’t enough to get it out, and even hot water took precious mage-energy. Bits of straw and hay had gotten everywhere, and even with the sand, their waste-box stank. Dara had been dumping the intact urn she had found and co-opted as a chamber pot into the open cellar-room, when she had the energy to carry it up; it could hardly make things down there any worse.

Karna had set aside her translation, and cooked a celebratory double portion of pease porridge. With extra salt. Dara hadn’t been able to finish her helping; after weeks of short rations, her stomach had shrunk.

She sat next to Vanyel, legs folded under her. Karna was sitting back, out of the way; she had pointed out that Vanyel didn’t know her very well, might well not remember who she was, and would probably be less overwhelmed if he woke to just one familiar face.

_:Ready?: _Need sent.

“I’m ready.”

_:I’ll try to bring him out of it gently: _

Dara waited. After a moment, she reached in and gripped Vanyel’s hand.

“Van,” she said. “Van, it’s Dara, I’m here…”

He moaned, tossing his head from side to side.

_:Give him a minute: _

Vanyel stirred aimlessly a few times, but it wasn’t until minutes later that his eyes drifted open, unfocused. He immediately squeezed them shut again; his face scrunched, a child’s expression of pain. He made a halfhearted attempt to tug his hand away from her. Dara held on.

Vanyel squirmed, weakly, and finally managed to turn his face into the pillow. It looked like he was _trying _to get his arm up to cover his eyes, but wasn’t strong enough.

Oh. “Van, are the lights giving you a headache?”

No answer, but it seemed likely. Dara wasn’t as good at the Kaled’a’in pronunciation, and it took her three tries to successfully dim the lights.

Finally, his eyes focused on her, and she felt his fingers tighten around hers.

“Van, hey, welcome back.” Dara could feel a smile spreading across her face.

His lips moved; no sound came out. A line of confusion appeared between his brows.

“Don’t try to use Mindspeech, all right?” Dara said quickly. “It’ll hurt a lot.” His channels were healed enough that he wouldn’t send himself into convulsions trying to use his Gifts, Need said, but it would take a lot longer for him to recover fully.

Vanyel’s tongue darted out to moisten his lips, and he tried again, croaking something incomprehensible.

“Sorry, I didn’t catch that.”

“Wh…?” Not quite a word, but she could guess at the direction.

“You want to know where we are? We’re still in Urtho’s Tower. You were hurt really badly. That’s why you feel awful. I’m sorry, we don’t have better painkillers than what I already gave you. But we’re going to get you out soon. Everything’s going to be fine. I promise.”

Vanyel only shook his head, grimacing.

“What?”

His throat bobbed as he swallowed, and he tried again. “Where’s…’Lendel?”

_Oh, gods._

Dara knew what she should have said, but she didn’t have the courage. “Van, I’m sorry. ‘Lendel…isn’t here right now.”

There was ‘disoriented’, and then there was ‘didn’t remember that his lifebonded had been dead for seventeen years’, and Dara had no idea how to cope with the latter.

“You just need to rest and get well,” she said, a little frantically. “Can you manage to eat some food for me? I’m sorry, it’s not very exciting, we just have pease porridge right now – Van, hey!” His eyes were starting to drift away from her.

_:He’s going to be in and out for a while: _Need sent. _:Just get him sitting up: _

Vanyel, once he realized what was happening, did try to help, but only in a way that actually made things harder for Dara; he was so weak that he could barely hold up his head, and he certainly couldn’t hold the spoon.

_I was really hoping for more of an improvement than this. _

Baby steps, she reminded herself.

_:Could be a lot worse: _Need sent. _:He’s calm. May not stay that way: _

_:What are you going to do now?: _

_:First, I’m going to take a nice long rest that I’ve damned well earned. I may be an immortal sword but I do get tired: _A sigh. _:Then I suppose we could give this Gating trick a try:_

* * *

“Van, hey.” A familiar voice. “Wake up a little? I need you to eat something again.”

Vanyel groaned and tried to pull away from it, burrowing under the blanket. The sound hurt his head, and the light did as well, and he didn’t understand _why_. Nothing that was happening made any sense.

_Where’s Savil? _

He had tried to ask, before, he thought, but he couldn’t remember if he had actually managed to ask out loud, or just in his thoughts, and he certainly couldn’t remember the answer. It was so hard to think.

“Come on.” Again the familiar voice, though he couldn’t seem to put a name to it, and someone was grasping his shoulders, lifting him. “Don’t have to open your eyes, but eat, your body really needs it.”

He didn’t understand why she was making him eat what felt like every five minutes. _Just go away and let me sleep. _He was thirsty, but even swallowing water was effortful, and he wasn’t hungry at all.

It didn’t seem he had a choice in the matter, though. He obediently swallowed the spoonfuls of overcooked, weirdly salty oat-porridge that she put in his mouth, and then sipped from the cup of hot, bitter liquid; the taste was familiar, but he couldn’t remember what it was. He tried to reach in and hold the cup, but his arms felt too heavy to lift and his hands weren’t working right, and someone else gently restrained him.

_‘Lendel, where are you? _

There was something wrong with his head. It hurt, and it was more than just the headache, it was deeper and colder and wronger. Wrong wrong wrong.

The hands laid him down again, and he tried to curl over onto his side, but he couldn’t manage that either, and he didn’t understand why.

“You want a different position?” the voice said, cheerfully. “That’s all right. I can help you out.”

Something was wrong with his bed. It was unreasonably itchy, and it smelled bad. Was he in the stables…?

No, because Yfandes wasn’t there, where was she, where where where–

Instinctively, he tried to reach for her.

**PAIN. **

He screamed, or he thought he screamed, everything was white-hot agony, and it was familiar, so familiar–

Someone was stroking his forehead. “Van, don’t, please don’t try to use your Gifts right now. You’re hurt. You need to rest and get better.”

That was familiar as well. Why?

The pain was receding now, a tide falling back, and he blinked away tears, swallowed the bile that had risen into his mouth.

A flicker of memory, hazy, the image of a dim-lit stone room, and a face…

Mardic.

He would like it if Mardic were there, he thought.

It was very tiring to speak, like he had to plan each stage of it, find the words, move his mouth, his tongue wasn’t working right for some reason, and sometimes he thought he had said something but he hadn’t. He didn’t understand why.

“Where’s Mardic?” he pushed out.

The hand on his forehead froze. “Van, I’m sorry, Mardic isn’t here right now. But you can go to sleep, all right? You’ll feel better if you sleep.”

It would be nice to sleep.

He stopped fighting it, and let himself slip away into the warm darkness behind his eyelids.

* * *

_Excerpts from the diaries of Urtho, the Mage of Silence_

_Translated by Karna shena Tale'sedrin_

_Kal’enedral and Scrollsworn to Kata’shin’a’in_

**Summer, circa 7 years before the Cataclysm**

_I received a letter today from Adept Kiyamvir Ma’ar. It has been so long, ten winters now, and yet it is rare that a week goes by without my thinking of him. _

_My brilliant, brash, impertinent pupil, who turned his back on all I might offer him, and made his own way in a far harsher Kingdom. He would say it was because he was needed there, and now he wishes to know what I think of what he has wrought. I know that he hopes I will be proud. _

_I will have to tell him that I do not much approve, and then perhaps we will retrace that old argument with paper and pen, or perhaps not. We both know all of the points that the other would say._

_Ma’ar has done well for himself, that is certain; he is first advisor to a King, at the tender age of thirty-three, when I myself did not become Archmage until eighty. _

_He is not shy to use this influence. It is not announced which policies are his, of course, yet I would recognize his touch anywhere. The use of compulsion-spells within the armies of Predain is now standard. They say it is for purposes of coordination, that men might work smoothly together with less need of drilling, but I see a darker purpose there. _

_It displeases me greatly, but this newest change is worst. They have declared blood-magic to be legal, taking the lives of convicts to fuel their public workings. Only those who volunteer, and they are promised a painless death and posthumous recognition for their service, a hero’s funeral; this is what Ma’ar writes to me in defence; but nonetheless it is not and cannot be a free choice. Ma’ar would say that these are men who would have been hanged anyway, and that the power bound in their blood might as well not go to waste. It is exactly his cold logic, and I do not like it any better now than I did before, but he is no longer my young pupil, that I might lecture on such matters. The time that Ma’ar might have listened is long past._

_Perhaps he is too far lost to the darkness. Perhaps he was from the very beginning. _

_And yet, he writes to me still, and in the words he pens, I see the light he carries as well. It is with pride that he offers the census-tallies on his Kingdom, year by year – and so like him, to share his tale in tables of dry figures, but he is right that they tell a story. Fewer soldiers have died in border defence since his policies were enacted. Three new Healers’ compounds were built by mages using the death-energy of sentenced murderers, their names marked on plaques by the doors, and he offers a calculation of how many lives might have been saved as a result. Few infants die each year; fewer mothers perish in childbirth. The cold logic of numbers, still, but there is a kind of heart in that also. _

**Spring, 18 months before the Cataclysm**

_Ma’ar is building an empire. _

_I might have seen the signs of this a decade ago, had I been looking. His meteoric rise to power and influence with the King of Predain, who they say now only listens to him. _

_He has built their army into a fighting machine, well-oiled by the darkest of compulsions. He requested the aid of my gryphons, and when I would not offer it, attempted his own Great Working, creating the makaar. It was hasty, of course, and ill-done – it could not be otherwise, when I took thirty years on my Working and he completed his in three – yet surprisingly effective for it, and he now has flying creatures on his side. His combat mages are trained in the use of blood-power. They say it is for use in exceptional circumstances only, but that is a thin excuse. _

_Kingdoms fall on either side, to be absorbed and taken into this monstrosity of his making, and I fear the day that he might see nothing left to the east or west or north, and will march south on Tantara. _

_In his last letter to me, he told me that he would not. Tantara is a Kingdom more prosperous and well-run than most, he wrote, and he does not wish for us to be enemies. In his private letters to me, he has floated the prospect of a formal alliance. _

_King Leodhan will not stand for it. He is afraid, and seeks my reassurance, which I cannot give. Ma’ar knows no limits, no scruples; he would not hesitate to march on us and tear down everything I have built in seventy years. The fact that I once took him in and taught him would not stay his hand. He claims to have great respect for me, and yet he does not heed my advice, and I am not sure what paths he leaves but for us to be enemies. _

_I do not feel as though Ma’ar is my enemy. And yet, perhaps by remembering the boy with fondness, I have blinded myself to the man he has become. Or it could be that all along, I saw only what I wished to see. His clever mind. His noble words. _

_Words are cheap. Actions speak louder. _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For anyone who's ben following along: a certain prolific author of ASFTV crackfics has now tried their hand at a short rationalfic oneshot for "Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker", and it's pretty fun: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22313200


	21. Chapter Twenty-One

Dara sat back on her heels, still gripping Need’s hilt. “Need…I think you can stop now. Looks like it doesn’t work. I don’t know what you’re doing wrong.”

It was their fifth try today. She had gone back to Rolan, begging for any more instructions; they hadn’t been able to find anything in Urtho’s notes about normal Gates, only some sketchy details about the theory of permanent Gates, that might be very useful to Savil someday – if they got out alive – but weren’t good for much now.

_:I don’t know either!: _Need sent, her frustration slapping Dara in the face. _:Are you sure your Companion didn’t just get it wrong?: _

“I don’t think he just got it wrong.” Dara sighed. “Need, it shouldn’t be _that _complicated – I mean, it’s a hard spell, but it’s not because it’s complicated, it’s because you have to hold all of the steps in your head at once, target the destination with multiple senses… Oh.”

_:What? Please enlighten me: _

Dara wiped the beads of sweat from her forehead with the back of her hand. “Need, you aren’t human. Er, anymore. You don’t have senses, really, you just borrow other people’s. Maybe, I don’t know, what it means for you to be in a place is different from what it means for a per– for a mortal human.” She had been about to say ‘person’, but Need would probably be very offended if Dara implied she wasn’t a person. “So maybe the spell needs to be different for you.”

_:Hmmff: _

“Let me think.” She sagged down onto the top stair. In the interest of not blasting poor Van with Gate-energy, they were doing this upstairs, on the doorway from the stairs to the upper balcony-room, with the hatch firmly shut, and for an extra margin of safety they had dragged Vanyel over into the spare Work Room and closed the door.

Even a day later, he was still… ‘Confused’ didn’t cover it. Completely out of his head. Dara probably ought to come up with some kind of coherent policy around what to tell him when he asked after people who were dead – so far, Mardic twice, Lancir three times, and Tylendel at least twenty times. It broke her heart, and she usually froze up and then said whatever she thought would comfort him enough that he would go to sleep.

The worst part was that once she _had _gritted her teeth and told him that ‘Lendel was dead, thinking that she had to get it over with sooner or later. He had been completely inconsolable, cried himself to sleep, woken a candlemark later, and apparently forgotten again.

When he asked for Yfandes, at least she could tell him honestly that his Companion was nearby and thinking about him and would be there soon.

As soon as they could get a damned Gate up.

_Pull yourself together, Herald. _She was on her own. No one else was going to solve this problem for her if she didn’t.

“Need,” she said. “You have a bond with me, right?” Nowhere near as deep as a lifebond – thank the gods for that, Dara had always thought lifebonds were creepy and was feeling that especially right now – but still. “Maybe we could, I don’t know, do a sort of concert-Gate, where I hold the spell and the destination in my head and you do the mage-energy part?”

A surprised, thoughtful pause.

_:Worth a try: _Need allowed, _:but I expect it won’t work. You’re not mage-gifted, not even in potential. If it were Shavri…: _A hopeful sigh.

Need missed Shavri, Dara thought. Her real bearer, in some sense; Dara was just borrowing her temporarily. It made her feel a little jealous, but that was silly. Need wasn’t like a Companion, she didn’t Choose one person until they died.

Mage-gifted…

“Oh!” It came to her in a flash. “Need, what about Karna? She was training to be a shaman – she’s mage-gifted. Not powerful enough to Gate on her own, but maybe both of you… Could she bear you?” Thank the gods that Karna was a woman.

Need sniffed. _:She’s not exactly my usual type, but she is Kal’enedral. She has a certain kind of courage: _

Dara still didn’t feel like she knew Karna very well, even though they had been down here alone together for a month. Still, it wasn’t hard to see how brave she was.

Karna didn’t think they were going to survive, and yet she wasn’t just giving up in despair; she was pushing herself, hard, to translate as many of the ancient diaries and texts as she could in the time they had. Dara had passed a few snippets along to Rolan, the ones relevant to Ma’ar; for Karna’s sake, she would try to do as many as she could, if it looked like they weren’t going to make it out after all.

_Don’t think about that. _

“I’ll ask her,” Dara said, standing.

Half a candlemark later, she and the Scrollsworn were sitting side by side, legs dangling over the edge of the now-reopened hatch – from up here, they could keep an eye on Vanyel without disturbing him.

“I am sorry,” Karna said softly, eyes downcast. “I cannot. Magic is foresworn to my people.”

“Right. Pact with the Star-Eyed.” Dara took a deep breath. Let it out through her nose. “Karna, don’t you think the Star-Eyed _might _forgive you for using magic one time, just one time, to get us out of here?”

She bowed her head. “My life is not so special.”

“It’s not just about your life!” Dara remembered to lower her voice. “Karna, if we die down here, then Leareth – Ma’ar – is going to win. He’s been gathering his army for decades. Valdemar has exactly eight other mages, well, Herald-Mages,” the mages in Baires didn’t really count, “and Vanyel is more powerful than all of them put together. And knows Leareth’s weaknesses better than anyone. We _need _him.”

Karna laid her hands on her knees. “No one person can bear the weight of a Kingdom.”

“Yes, you would think so. Point still stands.” Dara closed her eyes. “Karna… If we get out, you’ll be able to tell Urtho’s real story. All of it. Not just whatever snippets of it I can get out to Rolan before we starve to death! You’ll have time to translate everything, you’ll be able to bring in other scholars to check… Don’t you think that’s worth something? Don’t you think Urtho deserves that we keep his memory?”

Karna’s face clenched. “Perhaps the Star-Eyed wished this place to remain sealed, and that is why…”

“And that’s why all of this happened?” Dara could feel her face growing hot with anger. “You think this is a punishment? No! This happened because I was a goddamned idiot and touched something I shouldn’t have. And, I’m pretty sure the Star-Eyed wants Leareth dealt with. Which means we need to _not _die down here.” Her hands were wringing together in her lap, but she fought to keep her face level. “Karna, Vanyel is getting better. He’s going to recover. If we can get some more food in here, and eventually get him out when he’s stable enough to bring through a Gate.”

“You said once,” Karna pointed out.

Dara sighed. “Fine. If you think it’s fine to Gate once, and exactly once, then we’ll risk bringing Van out on the first go. It _probably _won’t kill him or burn out his mage-gift at this point, it’ll just set his recovery back by another month.” Though if they could just get him out, and back to Valdemar, a lot of things would be possible that weren’t from here. Savil could bring Moondance in, for one.

Although, once they left the Tower, they wouldn’t be able to get back in, and there were a lot of things they hadn’t gotten around to examining yet. There would be a few side benefits to being stuck in here another month or two, once they solved the lack of food, medicine, and any other supplies to speak of.

Karna was silent for a long time.

“I cannot,” she said finally. “I am sorry.”

Dara opened her mouth, and closed it. She had made all of her arguments; anything else would just be repeating herself.

“Please just think about it for a night,” she said dully. “Pray to the Goddess or something, see if she gives you an answer. We don’t have to decide right away.” She moved to stand, heading for the ladder, ignoring the fresh wave of weakness. “I’m going to check on Van.”

* * *

Dara knelt with her eyes closed, only blackness around her.

She wasn’t sure, exactly, what had compelled her to go back to the cellar-room. Which, for one thing, smelled strongly of stale urine as well as smoke. She had left her lantern at the top, and climbed down into a tube of darkness.

The stone seemed to be moving to crush her, but that felt oddly appropriate.

_Where do we go from here? _

Even the desperation was running out, now, leaving her with nothing but weariness. She had actually gotten to the point of considering holding a blade to Karna’s throat until the Scrollsworn agreed to try – but, aside from being something completely unacceptable for a Herald to do, she didn’t think it would work. Karna had accepted her own death already. She had absolute faith in her Goddess – and based on a few things she had mentioned offhand, the Shin’a’in believed in an afterlife, and that was where Karna thought she was going. Dara doubted there was any threat that could move her.

What would it be like, to believe that deeply that there was a greater Power on your side?

Dara couldn’t wrap her head around it. All her life, it had been just herself she could count on – and later, the other Heralds, and it was one of the best things she had ever felt, but they were still only people.

She hadn’t really thought about the gods at all until the past winter, when Vanyel’s tale had come out. It wasn’t that she had thought people were lying or deluding themselves, exactly, when they went to the temples to pray – she had just never considered it.

Karis had actually met her god. Dara had heard a dozen versions of it, each wilder than the last – she remembered hearing a garbled tale back in Sunnybrook and discounting it – but Savil had actually been there, and she said the basics were true. For a night, the soon-to-be-Queen had glowed with holy light, and been granted a miraculous power to heal. The people of Karse had taken it as an omen. Maybe it really had been one.

In the meeting before they left, Karis hadn’t looked like someone filled with divine certainty. She had looked tired, and confused, and scared.

Vanyel had met a god face to face. Two, actually, or at least they were assuming that the Star-Eyed and the Shadow-Lover were different beings. It had come up in his conversations with Leareth, according to his notes. If the gods weren’t on his side, well, they were certainly paying a lot of attention to him. _He would probably prefer they had left his life alone. _

–Would the gods intervene, to save them?

Dara felt her teeth gritting. She had never felt such a painful mixture of despair and hope.

It was out of her control.

_Please, _she found herself thinking, _please please please help us._

They ought to help Vanyel, if not her. It really did seem like the Star-Eyed Goddess had a stake in Vanyel defeating Leareth, and he wasn’t done yet–

But maybe they wouldn’t. Up on the surface, Vel’asha had denied all their requests for aid. Which meant the Goddess had. Maybe Vanyel was no good to them anymore – maybe the damage to his Gifts meant he wouldn’t be able to kill Leareth now, and so they were abandoning him to find a different pawn.

Or maybe it _was _deliberate. Not the punishment Karna had thought, but what if the gods knew that Vanyel had been questioning whether he even ought to stop Leareth, and no longer trusted him to fulfill his role in their plans?

There was probably no way they would ever know, even in theory.

_Who am I, to think I can bargain with the gods?_

Nothing. No one. A speck in the abyss. A little girl from a tiny hamlet no one had heard of, who had thought she mattered, because the Groveborn Companion had Chosen her – but Rolan wasn’t with her now.

Maybe she hadn’t ever mattered. She would die down here, alone, never even knowing why.

Unless she found a way out.

_I can’t. It’s too hard. _

She had thought she had faced it before, but she hadn’t, really. She had just been waiting, in a holding-pattern. Losing herself in the routine work that needed to be done, and hoping that at some point in the future they would find a solution.

The future was here now.

Was she just going to give up?

_No. _

It was a wave of wordless refusal that rose up in her – not like fire, but like water. Yielding yet implacable.

_We’re trying to do this impossible thing, _she had said to the others, in the Work Room. She had thought she understood it, then, but she hadn’t yet. Not deep down.

_Sometimes we fail_, Randi had said. _What it means to be a Herald is that when that happens, we don’t just give up. On the world, or on each other._ It had seemed very wise to her at the time, but she hadn’t understood it yet either. Maybe she couldn’t have, when she had never truly wanted to give up.

Vanyel had been wanting to give up for seventeen years, and he hadn’t. Because he couldn’t walk away. In her place, she knew that he wouldn’t just lie down and stop trying. He would find a way, no matter what.

Sitting in the darkness, her legs long gone numb under her, Dara squared her shoulders and lifted her chin. _Van, it’s all right. You don’t need to handle this one. I’ll figure something out._

* * *

Morning found Dara crouched at the top of the stairs, reaching for Rolan with all her might.

It had occurred to her the moment she woke. She was officially an idiot for not having thought of it sooner.

_:Rolan!: _she tried again.

_:Chosen?: _His mindvoice was distant, wavering, but she felt it strengthen as he steadied the connection with his more powerful Mindspeech.

_:I have a message for Vel’asha: _She squeezed her eyes shut; it felt important to get it exactly right. _:Can you ask her politely to walk the Moonpaths, and request advice from the leshy’a Kal’enedral again?: _

_:Of course: _Rolan’s tone was patient. _:What for, this time?: _

_:For whether Karna can use her own conscience to decide if it’s acceptable to use magic, just once, so she can Gate us out of here: _Somehow that seemed like an easier ask than getting the Goddess to order it directly. _:She won’t even be able to do it, later. Not without Need: _Karna just wasn’t powerful enough, alone. _:So it doesn’t really set a precedent. And it’s not a combat spell: _Well, Gates were used plenty in battle, but they weren’t, strictly speaking, offensive magic. _:I know her, and I don’t think it would tempt her to use magic again later: _Those were all the main considerations, she thought. Hard to imagine that a literal Goddess wouldn’t already be aware of them, but worth repeating anyway.

It was odd that Karna hadn’t thought to ask either. Or maybe not – it was such a deep injunction, just as taboo as, say, blood-magic in Valdemar.

And, like blood-magic, maybe it could be justified in this one unusual case.

Across the strained connection, she could feel Rolan thinking.

_:Of course: _he sent. _:I will ask her, and I will tell you the answer immediately: _

About a candlemark later, she and Karna were sitting on the side of the floating platform, legs dangling. Vanyel had obediently eaten his breakfast of, guess what, soggy oat-porridge with salt, and gone back to sleep.

“So that’s it,” Dara said. “Your Goddess is giving you the freedom to choose.”

The Scrollsworn’s eyes had gone very wide. “I had not thought – I would not – I am not so special!”

“You don’t have to be.” Dara kicked her legs back and forth, trying to find the right words. “Although, honestly, Karna, you were the one who volunteered to come down here with us. That was pretty brave. No one else did.”

“To see the home of our forefather Urtho?” Even now, it brought light to her face. “It was not an opportunity I could turn down.”

“I thought so.” Dara smiled slightly. “You’re a historian – you wouldn’t ever turn down learning something. And you want to honour his memory. Well, I don’t think Urtho would want one of his descendants to starve to death down here, if he were watching.” In the privacy of her thoughts, she could admit to herself that using that line was fighting dirty, but she didn’t care.

“No.” A flicker of awe. “He would not wish for even an outlander and stranger to die in his sanctum. It would desecrate this place, in a way.”

Dara tried not to look too hopeful. Karna was still conflicted – two sets of clashing ideals, Dara thought. _She just wants to be good. To do the right thing. _And she wasn’t sure what that meant. What her Goddess wanted, or where her conscience called. Dara suddenly felt a lot more sympathetic.

“Perhaps it would be right to make an exception,” Karna said finally. “This once.”

Dara, barely, managed not to jump in the air and squeal. She nodded solemnly instead.

“Although, I confess…” Karna hesitated, embarrassment in her face. “I may not have the skill needed. I was not taught mage-craft.”

“You have to learn exactly one spell,” Dara said. “Need knows it. So do I.” As much as any non-mage could, anyway. “We can prompt you through. Karna, you won’t even be able to do it on your own, later. Your Gift isn’t strong enough. It’ll be a one time thing, while you’re bearing Need.” She swung her bare feet, staring down at the platform below. “We don’t even know if it’ll work. All I’m asking is that you try.” Oh. “And…maybe trying it is a sort of test, of whether your Goddess wants this to happen.” Awfully tenuous reasoning in Dara’s opinion, but at this point she was desperate, and Karna did seem to have very deep faith in the Star-Eyed.

“Perhaps.” Karna lifted her head, and met Dara’s eyes squarely. “I will give it my full effort, I swear.”

* * *

Vanyel lay slumped with his head against the hard stone wall. It was very uncomfortable. He didn’t remember sitting on the floor being this unpleasant, usually, but it felt like his bones were digging into everything.

They were in a different room now for some reason. He thought it was a Work Room, it had that sort of feel. There was another one exactly like it, he thought, but it was empty. At least he thought it had been empty, and a real place. Maybe it had just been a dream.

This one had something in the middle of it, a weird agglomeration of wire and jewels and what he thought were animal skulls. The girl with him had told him to stay perfectly still and not touch it or go near it and _definitely _not to use his Gifts. She had carried him in, with another woman’s help, someone who wore tattered blue robes and seemed sort-of-vaguely-familiar but he had no idea who she was, she looked almost Tayledras but not.

_Why _he was in a Work Room with some kind of contraption in the middle of it that he wasn’t supposed to touch, Vanyel had no idea. The girl wouldn’t tell him; she just told him not to worry about it, it would only be for a couple of minutes, for the shielding. She was holding his hand tightly; it was hurting him, but it was too much work to tell her to stop. 

He couldn’t understand why he was too weak to sit up, let alone walk. It was very confusing and frustrating.

What was the girl’s name? He should have known it.

Dara, that was it, but he couldn’t remember how he knew her. A Herald, he thought. No, a trainee. Was she someone in ‘Lendel’s classes?

Vanyel wanted to ask her where ‘Lendel was, but speaking out loud was still tiring, and besides, he couldn’t remember what she had said before but he remembered thinking she was lying. He should have known the answer anyway. He thought it was something bad, but he couldn’t remember what kind of bad.

Something was wrong with his head. Not just the headache that wouldn’t go away no matter how much willowbark they gave him. He had complained of that once, and the Herald-trainee who was called Dara had brought him a dose of something she said was stronger, though she warned him she didn’t have a lot of it. It had mostly made him very sleepy. It hadn’t done anything about the cold feeling of _wrongwrongwrong _that lurked in the back of his mind, sucking at him.

He wanted Savil to hold him and stroke his hair, it wouldn’t fix it but it would be something.

Savil wasn’t there. At least the girl had been telling the truth, he thought, when she said that Savil was far away, but that he would see her again as soon as he was better.

There was a knock on the door.

Dara leapt to her feet, startling Vanyel enough that he almost tried to raise a shield, and flinched back just in time, when the pain surged but before it knocked him flat. They kept telling him not to use his Gifts, but he didn’t understand why, what was wrong, except he knew this had happened before. He had tried to ask what was the matter with him, but he must not have managed to ask out loud.

Dara’s hand paused on the doorknob, and she spun around. “Vanyel, I know you’re going to want to, but don’t use Mindspeech.”

He didn’t understand.

The door opened.

–He almost reached out with his mind anyway, despite the warning. _Yfandes. _She was standing in the weird dim warm-sunset light, it turned her white coat to red-gold, and her eyes were on him and she was _there. _Prancing with eagerness, but staying on the other side of the threshold. He couldn’t Mindtouch her, but he could still feel the warmth and light that was her, a glow off in the distance.

The most beautiful thing hin the world.

“Hey,” Dara said cheerfully, “why don’t we get _out_ of the room that has the potentially-world-ending weapon in it?”

What? That didn’t make any sense.

“How…?” Vanyel tried, as the woman in blue came back in and the two of them hauled him up between them.

“How did they get in?” Dara was grinning from ear to ear. “Gate. Should have some crates of food and supplies as well, and medicines – Van, we can give you some proper painkillers – _and _a real Healer.” A pause. “Sorry, Need.”

The aside didn’t make sense to Vanyel, but it was the least of the things that didn’t make sense, so he left it alone.

As soon as they crossed the doorway, Yfandes practically knocked all three of them over, nosing at his face, blowing into his hair, her mane falling into his eyes and making him sneeze.

“Back off, ‘Fandes,” Dara said, with amusement. “Let us get him settled.”

They laid him down on the nest of blankets and pillows – which did smell like a stable, for some reason, that had been very confusing before. Maybe it was a sort of a stable now that Yfandes was there. She settled down onto the floor with her head on practically on top of him, and he rested his hand on her neck and tangled his fingers in her mane. His own hand looked strange, wrong – too thin, the tendons standing out, skin a blotchy red-and-white.

“‘Fandes,” he whispered.

Dara squatted beside him. “She can’t Mindspeak to you yet, but I’ll relay. She says that she’s really, incredibly glad to see you, she missed you so much. She says that everything’s going to be all right. We’re going to go home soon, as soon as you’re well enough to travel.” Her eyes flashed downward, eyelids lowering. “Sorry, that probably does mean another month or two, but we’re learning a lot here – I think you’ll be glad of it as well once you’re feeling better.” She reached out and took his free hand again. Behind her, he saw another Companion – Rolan, that was right – sidle up behind her, bending his neck to nuzzle at her hair.

Home.

“We have a _lot _of food now!” Dara added brightly. “Good food, that will help you get stronger. And – oh, here she is. Do you remember An’dora?”

The very short, plump woman with jet-black hair and sort-of-Tayledras features did look very familiar, as she knelt beside Dara. No, not Tayledras, Shin’a’in. _We were in, what’s-it-called… _The name of the city eluded him, but he remembered colourful tents against the sky, and the abominable heat.

“You,” she said, in a voice that was strict and motherly at the same time, “have _not _been taking care of yourself since we last saw one another. You look dreadful. I am very unimpressed.” Then she smiled. “I am teasing you. We will set you right.”

She patted his shoulder and then turned away, eyes wide, darting around. “I can hardly believe it. I never thought I would live to see the inside of Urtho’s Tower! What a day.”

* * *

Harvestfest.

Shavri knelt on the floor, Jisa beside her. It was very late, well past her daughter’s bedtime, and she was very tired, but not enough to put off her annual tradition.

They had squeezed in a visit to the Temple of Kernos earlier, after the meetings and before the endless Court dinner and reception. Once they had finally escaped and were back in their quarters, her daughter had asked, shyly, if she could join her for her ‘private ceremony.’

A year ago, Shavri would have said no without hesitating. This year was different.

She had a book in front of her with a hundred and sixteen names in it. Only nine new ones, in the last five years – there had been other deaths, of course, at the temple she had burned a candle for poor Herald-Mages Elaina and Vatri and the other victims of the disastrous raid, but they weren’t really _hers. _She hadn’t been there, personally, trying and failing to save them.

Sovvan.

A hundred and sixteen lights, gone from the world, briefly remembered. It usually took her over a candlemark to light all of them. Maybe it was getting a little ridiculous, at this point, and she always felt self-conscious buying that many boxes of candles, but it still seemed right. Sacred.

_:Jisa: _she sent; her throat was already tight, blocked by the weight of tears. She held a taper, lit from the fireplace, and knelt in front of the board she had asked Kilchas to make her, full of holes to set the tiny, slender candles in. _:Pet, can you…?:_

_:Here, mama: _Jisa’s mindvoice was a gentle breath. Sadness, but she held it so lightly.

Shavri took the first candle. She didn’t even need to consult the list for this one. “For Kevran,” she whispered, and lit the candle with shaking fingers.

_:Mama: _Jisa’s hand rested on her thigh. Not such a small hand, anymore – almost as long as Shavri’s own, with sturdy callused fingers. Her daughter was all elbows and knees this year, still growing into her limbs. _:Can you tell me about him? If you remember: _

_:…Of course: _The tragic thing was, she didn’t remember, not for all of them, not anymore – but Kevran had been the first, and she wasn’t ever going to forget. _:He was five years old. I was a trainee. He had a cancer, and his parents brought him to us too late. He – he asked me if, if he would see the Shadow-Lover, and, and if his family’s cat would be there as well…: _

_:Oh: _Jisa wiped at her eyes. _:Mama, do you feel guilty? That you couldn’t save him?: _Only clean-edged curiosity in her mindvoice – gods, sometimes she really did sound like Melody.

_:No. Not guilty, exactly. Just sad: _Shavri shook her head, not bothering to do anything about the tears. _:I can’t save everyone. No one can. It doesn’t make me bad, but it doesn’t make it acceptable either. It’s still awful and a tragedy and it makes sense to grieve for it: _Words Vanyel had said to her, once, and it felt so strange saying them to her own daughter, who hadn’t even been conceived at the time.

His daughter. Which explained an awful lot about Jisa, really. _I know where she gets her stubbornness. _What a world. What a strange life that had ended up being hers.

_Van, damn it, where are you? _

He had been gone nearly six months. Randi wasn’t especially surprised or worried, just a little frustrated by the delay and uncertainty. _It’s a long way, _he had said, _and I expect they ran into some detours. If anything, it’s a good sign they’ve been away so long – it means they found something worthwhile. _

Wherever Van was, he was spending Sovvan far, far from home. _I hope you’re all right, Van. _

Shavri set the first candle in its slot, and Jisa already had the next one ready, the boxes open beside her.

Gemma might call it a waste, but it wasn’t nearly as wasteful as a hundred and sixteen deaths that she hadn’t been able to prevent.

Not enough, never enough.

Tonight, Shavri thought, she could try to grieve the way Jisa did. The way she herself had, once, when she was scarcely more than a child – it had been simpler, cleaner, before the weariness and weight of a thousand responsibilities piled onto her.

For one night, she could set that aside.

* * *

Dara was sitting back against the wall, on a cushion, munching from a bag of dried fruit. Which tasted incredible. _Everything _tasted incredible. She was sleeping on a real bedroll again; compared to the pile of smelly straw, it felt like a cloud.

She had clean clothes to wear. Soap. Tea to drink.

Amazing, how the same place could go from feeling like a prison to an adventure-land in a single swoop. She had come to _hate _this room, before, and she hadn’t thought it would be so easy to shift that.

Rolan being in it made all the difference.

“Need?” she said through a mouthful. “Want to go try the third cellar next?” The second one had held only ancient jars; of the ones that were still miraculously sealed, Dara definitely wasn’t going to eat what was in them, and probably wouldn’t have considered it even when they were still starving.

_:If you like: _

Karna was deep in her translations. An’dora was sweeping the floor; she was the most relentlessly _clean _person Dara had ever met, and had been very unimpressed by the mess Dara had left.

Vanyel was curled up half on top of Yfandes, bundled in blankets; she thought he was asleep. Probably worn out, after An’dora had coaxed him to stand – just stand up for about a minute, supported on both sides, not even taking a step – this morning. ‘Morning.’ It was probably some random other time of day in the outside world.

Even that much was progress. Van had lost a lot of muscle while he had been immobile and under-nourished. Now he could actually hold a cup and lift it all the way to his mouth; the timing on that had worked out well, around the same day that he had first seemed embarrassed to need help with something so basic. Which was a step forward as well, in a way; it meant he was closer to being in his right mind. The Vanyel who hadn’t minded being spoon-fed had bothered her more.

He was slowly putting on weight; he still looked like he might blow away in a strong wind, but really, that wasn’t so different from usual for him. He was quite foggy from the strong pain-drugs, but he knew where he was most of the time, even if he was hazy on how they had ended up there, and this morning he had asked whether they had found anything yet. She had reminded him about the crates of old books, told him that Karna was successfully translating them, and his face had lit up with a real smile.

At one point, about a week ago, he had beckoned her in close, and asked in a whisper. _Is Leareth real or did I dream that too? _Dara, taut with nerves, had almost burst out laughing, which would have been very unhelpful. She had explained that technically he had, in fact, dreamed about Leareth, but the mage was definitely real.

Vanyel hadn’t seemed very surprised. She had watched him shake off some of the grogginess, his expression quiet and serious, and he been almost entirely lucid for a few minutes afterward, asking her questions about the various events of the last six months. Putting together the pieces, and for a moment he had seemed like his old self, just tired and foggy.

Until he dozed off, woke up a few candlemarks later, and had apparently forgotten where he was again.

Miraculously, he was taking it all with good grace, and wasn’t even particularly cranky. Maybe because An’dora had started dosing him with the herb-mix again the day she arrived. Dara would have been throwing things at people by now from sheer frustration, in his place.

He hadn’t asked her about ‘Lendel since Yfandes had come back.

…Gods, she hadn’t even thought about how hard it must have been for him to be separated from his Companion, after what had happened earlier in the year.

Dara’s eye drifted to the wall, and the charcoal markings. Two weeks since the Gate – coming on two months they had been in the Tower. It must be well into autumn now…

Oh.

Count back in her head… _:Rolan, what day is it?: _

Rolan, curled up on his straw-bedding in the corner, lifted his head. _:Your suspicion is right. Today is Harvestfest: _

Her eyes flicked back to Vanyel. _:Should we tell him?: _

_:Do you want to?: _

_:I mean, not particularly: _He looked so comfortable. Peaceful. _:But have a feeling he would want us to: _

_:You could ask Yfandes: _

That was a good point. Vanyel could Mindspeak with his Companion a little now – that was one of the biggest improvements of the last couple of days – but it still hurt him, and Yfandes kept it to a minimum, so Dara was relaying. She had gotten into the habit of talking directly to his Companion, even if it had felt very weird at first.

_:Yfandes?: _she sent, not sure if the mare was dozing as well.

She wasn’t; she lifted her head, blue eyes fixing on Dara, and she must have immediately picked up on the question from the overtones. _:I know. Sovvan. I hadn’t decided yet: _A sigh. _:But I think we should: _

Dara rose to her feet. _It’s so easy. _She would start to take it for granted again soon, she was sure, but for now it felt like a miracle just not being exhausted and achy and cold all the time.

She probably wasn’t going to ever like pease-porridge again. And the salt-water ‘soup’ was best forgotten.

“Van?” she said, kneeling.

He wasn’t deeply asleep, and he stirred, lifting his head from Yfandes’ flank. “Mmm?”

“I wanted to talk to you about something. Are you up for that right now?”

“Hmm. Think so.” He rubbed his eyes, and smiled ruefully.

Dara hesitated. “You remember where we are right now?”

He made a show of glancing around the room. “Still Urtho’s Tower, looks like.”

“Yes. And do you know how long we’ve been here?”

“Haven’t the faintest idea.” He yawned. “Sorry. Um, we were in…city with tents…?”

“Kata’shin’a’in,” she prompted.

“Mmm. In summer, must’ve been. Can’t be that hot _all _the time.”

Dara was smiling despite herself; Vanyel having something like a sense of humour again was so deeply reassuring. She forced her face back into a solemn expression. “We left just over a month after Midsummer, and we’ve been in the Tower for two months. Today is Sovvan.”

“Oh.”

She watched the flicker of expressions across his face, surprise, shock, grief – and then he put his shorn head down and buried his face in Yfandes’ side.

It was still weird, seeing him with hardly any hair, and the new growth coming in mostly silver. He hadn’t actually said anything to her about it yet. Maybe he would think it was just from the accident, and not blame her for it. She wasn’t going to bring it up if he didn’t.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I thought you’d probably want us to tell you. Um, if you want to be alone for it, you and Yfandes can have the Work Room.” The one that didn’t have a potentially world-ending weapon in it, obviously. Karna had been working on helping them decipher the plaques that were with each of the devices, but they still didn’t really know what most of them did.

They all had instructions on how to destroy them, which was very interesting. Dara had asked Karna whether that was what they ought to do. Karna had said they would ask one of the _leshy’a Kal’enedral _once they had a way to pass messages topside again.

Rolan seemed to think the answer was going to be no, but he was being cagey about it and wouldn’t say anything more. Dara couldn’t bring herself to mind; she was too happy just being in rapport with him all the time, greedy for his simple presence.

“No,” Vanyel said without lifting his head. “Could you…just be nearby?”

“Of course.” Dara hesitated. “Do you want candles? We have loads now.” Though all of them were proper tall, fat candles, meant to burn all night, not the slim little ones they made for Sovvan at the temple.

Wasteful, but maybe that was fine. They could always get more and they didn’t really need them for light anyway. Besides, what was it that Vanyel had said, at the Midsummer rites?

_It’s not a big enough fire, you know? _

If a pyre the size of a house was still too small, certainly a night-candle was, but it was something.


	22. Chapter Twenty-Two

Vanyel lay with his back propped up against the pile of cushions, two blankets draped over him. Even with Yfandes curled up on her pile of straw next to him, radiating body heat, he was cold all the time. _I’m still pretty much a skeleton with skin on. _

_:’Fandes: _he sent, apropos of nothing. It didn’t quite hurt now, but he could feel the strain of it even with her. It was worth it.

Her damp nose found his forehead, and he felt her warm breath on his face. _:I love you, Chosen: _

She hadn’t left his side at all, except to relieve herself in the box in the corner. He couldn’t bring himself to mind her clinginess at all.

At least he could get up and walk a few steps now, with help. It seemed silly, that his daily exercise consisted of doing that once or twice, but just walking to the wall and back was as tiring as a candlemark’s sparring with Tran. Though it was hardly the first time he had been seriously ill and spent weeks abed, this time it seemed to be taking forever for his strength to come back.

Probably because he was getting old. Thirty-three now – his name day must have just passed.

An’dora had him doing stretches and exercises with his hands as well, squishing a cloth sack overstuffed with a mix of wool and beans to build strength, practicing fastening and unfastening the ties and buttons on his tunic for dexterity. He had tried his hand at his lute, and given up in frustration after thirty seconds – his fingertips were still very tender, and it hurt – but An’dora thought he could work up to it. Which would give him something to do with himself, anyway.

As long as he remembered to leave his Gifts alone, the headache wasn’t too bad, and he wasn’t taking the strong painkillers except at ‘night’ to sleep – they were underground, so night was arbitrary, and was pretty much whenever Dara decided she was going to bed and dimmed the mage-lights. It was the itchiness that bothered him more than the pain, actually. An’dora had a salve that she rubbed on his hands and arms every day, and it helped, but the itch still woke him in the middle of the night sometimes.

He still felt foggy, and he hadn’t totally pieced together the course of the last few months, but his mind was working better now. Enough that he was bored, sitting around in bed too weak to do anything at all. He had asked Dara to bring him his notes from Kata’shin’a’in – he still didn’t remember most of it very well, but rereading what he had written seemed to help bring it back.

Slowly. Even concentrating enough to read would tire him after a few minutes, and he would end up dozing for candlemarks. It was ridiculous.

At one point, he had been worried that his mind was injured the way Starwind’s had been, and he wouldn’t ever be able to think as well as before. Which would be awful. Need had reassured him that it definitely wasn’t the case. _You’re out of practice is all, _she had said. She had apparently kept him forcibly unconscious for nearly a month while his channels healed.

If the trouble was just that his brain was as out of shape as his body, well, there was a clear answer to that – exercise both. Not too much too fast, he was familiar with the dangers of overdoing it, but he had come up with some memory-exercises to test himself. He had never had anything near Yfandes’ skill at mental arithmetic, but right now he struggled to multiply two-digit numbers in his head, which was just embarrassing.

It seemed promising so far – he felt clearer-headed every day. His Gifts worried him more. Mindspeech seemed to work, and his control was acceptable, but his range was terrible; he couldn’t even reach Dara when she was across the room.

His mage-gift, he had left alone entirely. Need said his channels had been damaged very badly and were still fragile. All he knew was that something felt wrong, and he wouldn’t know how bad it was for weeks or months.

_Will I ever be able to fight again?_

A terrifying thought, that he might not be able to count on his power anymore – but, oddly, not as frightening as losing the ability to think. _I know which of those is more important. _It was too soon to tell, anyway, and not worth panicking about, which Yfandes reminded him of often.

Dara and Karna were both happy to go along with his requests that they make stimulating conversation with him, even when he was too groggy to completely follow it. Karna had been coming to sit with him often, and reading her translations from Urtho’s diaries out loud, the ones that pertained to Ma’ar.

As he had half-expected, they told a different story.

_There is a spark in him. He seeks to protect others who are vulnerable. _

In his earliest entries, Urtho – a man who had been brave and good in many ways, if not always wise – had looked at Ma’ar, and seen someone who cared.

_ There is a darkness in him, but there is great light as well. _

_He said that is why he must leave. Because Tantara flourishes, and so that is not where he is needed. _

_If Ma’ar is lost to darkness, it will be not because he cares too little, but because he cares too much. _

Urtho’s way of writing about what he saw as good and evil was strange. Black and white, almost. The way ‘Lendel might have described it, if he had been more poetic – and the void rose, thinking his name, but Vanyel rode out the grief.

Gods, he remembered not remembering that ‘Lendel was dead – and realizing it again, more than once, weeping because it didn’t make sense and he didn’t understand, _‘Lendel why aren’t you here? _

–He remembered talking to the Shadow-Lover, that was one moment of clarity in the haze, and the warning he had received. _You will perhaps regret it very much in the short run_. Maybe the Shadow-Lover hadn’t known that he would spend the first weeks of it in Healing-sleep, not feeling or remembering the pain. It had been unpleasant enough even with that – days, weeks, of confusion, waking up not knowing where he was. Not understanding the emptiness in his mind, and why he hurt so much, only knowing that something was terribly wrong.

Well, it was over, and he had survived it. Learning a lesson in the process, hopefully.

Moving on; it was difficult to keep his thoughts on track, still.

Urtho. Ma’ar.

Urtho’s later writings had been darker, more in line with his final words to Ravenwing.

_Perhaps he is too far lost to the darkness. Perhaps he was from the very beginning. _

_It could be that all along, I saw only what I wished to see._

_Words are cheap. Actions speak louder. _

Which of those frames was true?

Probably that wasn’t the right way to think of it. Neither was ‘true’ – they were the personal journal entries of a busy, distracted scholar with a great deal on his mind, filtered through a translation that might or might not capture all the nuances. Karna tried to make it clear, when she wasn’t sure about the exact meaning or connotation of a word, but that only added the appropriate uncertainty.

Urtho had cared about his pupil, and wanted to see him succeed. He had admired some of Ma’ar’s qualities – his cleverness, curiosity, his determination and drive. His relentless desire to protect everyone and everything.

And the things Urtho had criticized… Ma’ar’s ruthlessness, his ability to think dispassionately, his desire to look for numbers that could be measured rather than blindly following what felt right and good. Even what Urtho called his impertinence. _I’m not sure those are bad things. _

If Vanyel had had any remaining doubts that Ma’ar was Leareth, Urtho’s entry about the blood-magic and compulsion-spell policies in Predain and settled it; they might as well have carried Leareth’s stamp.

He didn’t know what to think anymore.

* * *

Jisa adjusted the collar of her gown and then forced her hands back to her lap. She wasn’t sure why she was so…not nervous, that wasn’t quite the thing, but something. Restless, itchy.

The dining-table in the King’s suite was set for seven people. Her mama and papa, Jisa herself, Savil, and Lissa, Uncle Van’s older sister, who was a general in the Guard and had been a hero in the Battle of Sunhame. 

And Treven.

The heir to the throne of Valdemar was almost fourteen, now, and Papa wanted him to start sitting in on meetings soon, even though he was just a trainee. _I don’t want him thrown into it suddenly, _he had said.

An unpleasant, unwanted reminder that Papa might die anytime.

_I’d like him to get to know some of the key people first_, Papa had said. _In casual situations, to help him relax around us. _

Thus the dinner party. Tantras had been invited, but he had said he was too tired after the Council meeting, and Lissa was free so she had taken his place. Jisa had only met General Lissa Ashkevron in passing, before, probably at some Court reception or other, and thought she was very exciting.

Jisa had put on her best gown and done her hair properly even without Mama asking her. She still missed having Beri to help braid her hair, but she was getting quite good at doing it by herself and not having it come out crooked.

A lot of candles were lit – it was dark outside, the days were getting shorter again. Two weeks past Sovvan now. The Palace bell had just rung. Papa was still in his room with Mama, getting dressed in his formal Whites.

There was a knock.

Jisa jumped up and ran to the front door to open it, even though there was a page right there who had helped set the table.

“Welcome!” she said brightly, before she even saw who it was. “Come in!”

It wasn’t Treven; it was just Savil and Lissa. Neither of them was in uniform. Savil was wearing Tayledras robes, in a goldenrod sort of colour that was much nicer on her than white, and Lissa wore a dark red brocade gown with bits of yellow-gold embroidery, high-necked in front, but that left her shoulders bare and dipped to a V in the back. It was a sort of style that Jisa recognized from the courtiers in Sunhame; Lissa must have gotten it when she was living there and leading the Guard to make Karse peaceful again.

Lissa was so glamorous. It almost wasn’t fair.

“Jisa.” Savil smiled at her, in a distracted sort of way. “I swear, you’re more grown-up every time I see you.”

Jisa bobbed her head in agreement. She was eleven and a half, and almost as tall as Mama – the top of her head was level with Shavri’s eyebrows. In the mirror, she thought that her face was starting to look less like a little girl.

Other things were changing, too. Her chest was still mostly flat, but her breasts stuck out just a tiny bit, tender bumps under the skin. And she had _hair _growing, in places that had been very alarming at first. Mama had sat her down and had a Talk with her about all of the things that were normal for a girl her age. _You’re growing up, pet. Feels like it’s happened so fast…_

She led Savil and Lissa over to the table and showed them to their seats. Mama and Papa were just coming out of the bedroom. Papa had his cane, but his formal Whites hid how thin he had gotten, and he was smiling. Mama couldn’t block his pain during the meal, Randi still needed to be in trance for it, but she could do it without Jisa or Savil’s help now, and so could Gemma and Andrel, though Mama was still the best at it by far.

Papa said he found the pain easier to bear when he knew it could end whenever he wanted, if he was willing to stop doing what he was doing and go into trance. Sometimes he would ask Mama with Mindspeech to do it for only a minute or two, and it wouldn’t even be very obvious to anyone watching, but Jisa always knew.

They could have asked Stef to come, but Stef had already covered an audience in the afternoon, and he was very busy – he was still supposed to be finishing his training as a Bard, _and _he had spy-lessons with Katha and sometimes did real missions for her now. He had a disguise and everything, though it must have been an embarrassing disguise because he had refused to show Jisa.

Mama pulled out the chair for Papa so he could sit, and then came over and kissed Jisa’s forehead. “You look lovely, pet. How were your classes?”

Jisa had submitted to the inevitable, and was taking classes at the new Collegium, with the Blues. The dean had given her some tests and decided to put her with the third-year students, who were almost all between fifteen and eighteen. They hadn’t really known what to do with her at first, but Jisa was good at being friendly, and she _was _the King’s daughter even if she was a bastard. No one ever said that word to her face, though she was sure they whispered it. She was consistent enough about shielding now that she hadn’t overheard anyone think it, like she had sometimes when she was a little girl.

“Very good,” she said. “We were learning about how builders make bridges. There was lots of maths.” Jisa wasn’t as good with her figuring as she was with reading and writing and history, and this was a lot more than just arithmetic, but the teacher was clever and she liked it so far.

Mama smiled crookedly, as she pulled away and went to sit with Papa. “Well, I’m very glad you’re learning it now. Don’t ask your poor mother for help – I never really got past the basics. Your Uncle Van is a lot better at it, and his lady Yfandes is incredible.”

That was a funny thought. “How does Yfandes do maths?” Jisa said curiously. “All in her head? She doesn’t have hands.”

Papa answered. “Mostly in her head, I think – Companions tend have very good memory – but if it’s especially complicated, she would borrow Van’s hands for it. They did the calculations for the new Web-alarms that way.”

Then a shadow passed across his face, and he and Mama exchanged one of those significant looks they did sometimes. Jisa didn’t think they realized how obvious it was. She really _wasn’t _trying to dig and poke at it – she had sworn an oath – but she couldn’t help noticing, and the quiet voice in the back of her mind would add it to the tally.

_I’m not stupid. _She knew something was wrong, and that Uncle Van’s ‘trade-mission’ to Rethwellan and Jkatha was nothing of the sort. It was almost certainly a spy-mission, though she and Stef had been very good and hadn’t speculated on it at all.

Savil and Lissa were talking now, and Jisa tried to pay attention.

“…with the Guard?” Savil was saying.

“Your damned mages, you mean?” Lissa said.

“Language!” Mama hissed under her breath.

“Sorry, Shavri.” Lissa didn’t sound very sorry.

“They’re not my mages,” Savil muttered.

“Fine, Tashir’s mages.” Lissa sighed. “Well, I suppose they’re not entirely useless. Sounds like Sandra finally got the two craftsmen churning out shield-talismans for our people. And that woman who used to be mercenary-guards agreed to train with Kilchas on combat techniques. She’s all right, I guess.” A flash of a smile. “Tried to get her drunk once, I took the lot of them out to the tavern after we drilled all afternoon, and she kept pace with me all night. I can respect a woman like that.”

Mama was pursing her lips, looking very disapproving, but she didn’t say anything out loud.

“And your student?” Lissa said.

Savil shrugged. “Fine, I guess. He’s starting to get the hang of shielding, and he throws a wicked fireball. Quite the natural talent for fire-magic, actually.” She winced. “Not the best combination with a short temper, unfortunately.”

Jisa tried to keep her face controlled. She knew exactly who Savil’s student was, because he had been seeing Melody, and then Terrill, who had gotten tired of him and dumped him on_ her._

Mama – and Melody – would probably have a fit if they knew how little supervision she was getting in her ‘lessons’ with Terrill. After about three months, he had clearly decided that she was as good as fully trained and no matter if she wasn’t quite twelve, and started offloading the patients who ‘got along better with her’. Well, it was true that she had gotten a lot more training than _he _ever had; he had grown up in Exodus, and been apprenticed to the village Healer, but that mostly meant he had figured out how to use his Gift on his own with a bit of help from someone who was an adult and a Mindspeaker.

Jisa had quietly decided not to tell Mama about the recent developments. She liked being given some real responsibility, and she felt more than ready for it. Melody had been teaching her since she was seven; that was almost five years.

She had thought Terrill was lazy as first, but now she thought Melody was the one who was strange. Terrill had a wife and a baby and he didn’t want to work late into the evenings, which seemed very reasonable to her.She still didn’t think Terrill was as good as Melody at using his Gift, but he was better at a few things – like being warm and friendly and making people feel comfortable, which made a surprising difference. He was very patient and he gave good advice.

Apparently not patient enough to deal with Arkady Mavelan. Jisa supposed the boy could be annoying, especially when he acted like everything was someone else’s fault, but it was true that a lot of the things that had gone wrong in his life really were unfair. She had been worried that he wouldn’t like to take advice from someone who was younger than him _and _a girl, but he actually seemed less defensive with her. They mostly played games together – he was very competitive – and she let him bring up problems he was having when he wanted to.

He also tended to no-show at least every other week; she could guess that having to be at a particular place at a specific time felt coercive to him, and she didn’t push. You couldn’t force trust, Melody had always told her, and besides, it meant she had a break.

“Kilchas brought up the idea of a Mages’ Collegium again,” Savil was starting to say. “I don’t know if–”

There was a knock on the door.

This time, Jisa stayed in her seat, trying not to fidget. She had almost forgotten Treven was coming. Mama was the one who got up.

“I’m very sorry to be so late, Healer Shavri.” In the six months or so since she had talked to him at the spring festival, Treven’s voice had started breaking – it cracked and dropped several tones in the middle of the sentence. Jisa held back a snicker. It wasn’t his fault that he sounded ridiculous.

Mama ushered him into the room and pointed him to his seat. He was wearing his formal trainee Greys again, or rather a new pair, he had grown. All the Herald-trainees wore grey now, but the formal version was a darker, more charcoal-y colour. The last time, Jisa had thought it looked like he’d taken normal Whites and rolled in a coal-scuttle, but she had to admit that it was quite a flattering look on him, contrasting with his vivid blue eyes and his golden hair tied back in a tail. There was just a hint of blond fuzz on his upper lip. He looked even more like Tantras now.

His eyes were fixed on her.

_You will not blush_, Jisa told herself firmly. She wasn’t sure why she felt so funny around Treven. Maybe because he was going to be King, and that was such an odd thought.

Clearly Treven felt just as awkward around her. Because she was Randi’s daughter and he felt like she should have been the heir? Jisa didn’t know. There were two spots of pink blooming on Treven’s cheekbones, and she tried not to smirk.

Treven dragged his eyes away from her, and turned to grip Papa’s arm. “Randi, it’s a pleasure. Herald-Mage Savil, you look very fine – is that robe Tayledras? Oh, and you must be General Lissa Ashkevron. I don’t think we’ve met properly before. It’s an honour. I’ve heard so much about your work in Karse…”

He had very good manners, there was that. It wasn’t really fair to find it irritating.

“Jisa.” He was looking at her again, and beaming. It wasn’t _fair _for anyone’s smile to be that blinding. “You look very well. How are your Mindhealing lessons going?”

Jisa froze. She didn’t have a story prepared – Mama and Papa never asked any more questions once she said they were going fine and Terrill was nice to her, but Treven looked like he actually wanted to know.

“I have a new teacher,” she said. “Melody volunteered to go north. I miss her, but it’s good to learn from someone with a different style…”

* * *

“Dara?”

She looked up vaguely. “What, An’dora?”

Their space was starting to look quite homey, now. Vanyel was recovering, but slowly enough that An’dora and Need had firmly agreed on not taking him through another Gate anytime in the next few weeks, and so he had been relegated to one of the other Work Rooms again while Karna and Need co-raised a second Gate and held it for a whole half-candlemark, long enough to bring in all of the additional supplies that Rolan had thoughtfully requested be held at the surface. Need had taken half a day to recover afterwards before she could even heat water, and Karna had been exhausted and slept for _ages_, but it was entirely worth it. They had _chairs _now.

Dara had even gotten to dash outside and stand in the sun and fresh air. She hadn’t wanted to go very far, in case the pair of them got tired, but she had stood in the crisp autumn air with her head flung back, just looking at the sky, until she got cold and slipped back inside.

…It was a little worrying. The first snows were going to start soon, and traveling the Plains in winter was going to be a lot more gruelling. Enough that she didn’t particularly want to subject Vanyel to it at all.

_Are we going to be stuck here until spring? _

She was homesick, but overall, she wouldn’t mind that much. It was a lot more fun exploring, now that she had Need to accompany her – and they were being very, very careful.

“Dara,” An’dora said again. She was kneeling on the floor, staring intently at it. “Did you know that there is a moveable stone, here?”

“…What?” Dara leapt to her feet and darted over. “…Oh. I do see it now.” It was invisible at a distance, because it was exactly flush with the floor, and the same white-coloured stone, but there was a definite crack.

“I imagine it might drop down, and fit into a slot carved in the rock.”

_Now I feel like an idiot. _Dara had somehow missed noticing it for months. Then again, for most of it the floor had been half-covered in loose hay that she had given up on doing anything about.

“You have eagle eyes,” she said.

An’dora only smirked. “A Healer must be observant. Now, there is surely a mechanism, something dreadfully clever…”

Dara leapt to her feet. “I’ll ask Need.”

Ten minutes later, they were all kneeling around the spot on the floor. Karna had set aside her work, and even Vanyel had dragged himself out of his bedroll to come look.

_:There are four points: _Need sent.

“Four points,” Dara relayed automatically. At the very least, Vanyel wasn’t going to be included; Mindspeech with anyone except Yfandes was still causing him a great deal of pain.

_:The only question is, what order?: _A pause. _:Wouldn’t be surprised if it’s something with ritual significance. Karna, An’dora – any thoughts?: _

“Hmm.” Karna’s fingertip stroked the catch. “If not all at once, perhaps East, South, West, and North. That is the order in our rituals, with the Maiden being in the East and the Crone in the North."

_:Someone with hands feel like giving it a try?: _

Dara reached forward, and then stopped. “Um, can someone remind me which way is east?” She probably should have thought about that at some point in the last two and a half months, but she hadn’t.

Karna and An’dora both pointed at once.

“Thank you.” She reached for the east point, and then stopped. “…Do we think this is going to make anything explode?”

An’dora laughed. She had a pleasant laugh, Dara thought, deep and rich in her chest. “In the floor of his main room? I doubt it.”

“Wouldn’t put it past Urtho,” Dara grumbled. No one else seemed worried; Vanyel was distracted, staring into the distance, and Karna was smiling as well, clearly amused by her paranoia. She folded her arms. “I’m serious! I think we should actually talk about this. Last time I broke into a secret room, it went _really badly_.”

Silence.

Karna leaned in. “I agree with An’dora that it is not likely Urtho would set a trap in the floor of his vault, where his servants would tread. I do not think opening it will be risky. Objects we find within might be.”

Dara rubbed her hands together. “New plan. We open it, but no one touches _anything_ until Need looks at it with mage-sight and tells us it’s safe.” She glanced over. “And Vanyel stays behind – and goes in the shielded room when we go down there, just in case. Sorry, Van, but if anything goes off, you’re the most vulnerable right now.”

He didn’t seem defensive at all, to her surprise, only nodded. “That’s reasonable. I’m not up for climbing down any trapdoors right now anyway.”

“Right, then. Let’s try.” Cautiously, she pressed down on the tiny, barely-visible round section in the stone.

Like in the cellar-room, it stayed depressed; it would have perfectly fit a coin.

Karna hunted around a little for the second and third, and An’dora pressed down on the fourth.

Absolutely nothing happened.

“Damn.” Dara sat back on her heels. “This one’s stuck too.” And she doubted she’d have any luck getting her belt-knife into that fine a crack. The workmanship was impressive.

“Try yanking it out of the floor,” Vanyel suggested with a smirk.

“Shut up.” But Dara found herself smiling as well. She stood up, fixed her eyes on the spot in between the trigger-points – and stamped on it, hard.

There was a loud grating sound, and an octagonal section of stone dropped by about an inch. Dara staggered, catching herself, and then jumped on it with both feet. With a scream of stone-on-stone, it sank another few inches, and then stopped with a crunch.

Dara fell over.

“Now you’ve broken it,” Vanyel said, eyebrows raised.

An’dora was peering in. “It has slid a little to one side. I think we need some kind of lever, to force it.”

_:No: _Need broke in, _:I am not a pry-bar. Don’t even think about it: _

“We have a broomstick,” Dara pointed out.

An’dora’s nose scrunched. “If you break my broom…”

It took a few more minutes of wrestling with it before they had it fully open.

“Need, mage-light?” Dara said, peering down at the stairs that vanished into the inky blackness.

_:Get a damned lantern. We brought them for a reason: _

Karna stood up to fetch and light one of their lanterns. She tied it to a rope, and lowered it gradually into the darkness.

“More stairs,” she said. “It goes deep.”

Dara’s fingers tightened around the hilt of the sword belted at her waist. Karna _could _bear Need, and they swapped back and forth as necessary, but the blade had a clear preference. “Need, do you sense anything down there?”

_:Traces of magic, to be expected. Little else: _

An’dora straightened up from her heels. “I will go to the shielded room as well, until Need has declared it safe.”

That was a good idea, one Dara should have thought of – if any of them did get hurt, they definitely wanted the Healer to be available and unaffected.

She took a deep breath. A dark corner of her mind was gibbering that going down into secret cellars was a _terrible idea, _and it sort of had a point, but they were taking reasonable precautions, and whatever they found down there might be very valuable.

She took a step, then another, the lantern in her hand. Karna followed, entirely undaunted.

They stopped at the bottom. Behind her, Dara heard Karna say the command for the mage-lights.

The room blazed to life.

_Oh. _

It was a large room, only slightly smaller than the center of the vault above, but it felt very crowded. It wasn’t anything like a standard Work Room – those were usually quite bare. This reminded Dara of Sandra’s workshop in her spare room, which she had only seen a couple of times. A place where anything, magic and not, could be taken about, rebuilt, investigated, played with…

Glassware and jars, still intact, showed dust and residue where chemicals had once been. There was a table dedicated to wood-working, with a lathe, clamps, vice, and assorted tools. Another station was for metalworking, and there was even one for glassblowing, that held several beakers and more complex apparatuses in various states of completion.

All of the tables were covered with incomplete projects, scattered with notes and diagrams on the same sort of creamy, fine not-quite-paper they had seen in Urtho’s notebooks. These were looseleaf, rather than bound, and had an odd sheen to them.

A fine sheen of dust covered everything, but surprisingly little. Maybe because the air had been perfectly still, untouched, for almost two thousand years.

_Sandra would give a leg to see this place, _Dara thought. “This is incredible,” she breathed. “You could imagine he just got up and walked out…”

“Perhaps he did,” Karna whispered. “The war escalated very quickly. I imagine he did not have time to finish any of these artifacts, once it had begun.”

There was something very sad about that. _Everyone dies in the middle of something_, someone had said to her once – Savil, probably – and Dara had thought it was very wise. Everyone, even the foremost mage-scholar of a forgotten golden era. Leaving behind messy desks and unfinished notes. It brought tears to her eyes.

They stood in the center of the room, very carefully not touching anything.

“Need,” Dara said. “Tell us what’s safe.”

She felt a tug. _:That brooch, for one. It’s not magical at all, and it’s rather pretty. You should take it. Or try to finish it, I should say: _

Now that Need pointed it out, Dara saw that there was in fact a half-complete brooch in the shape of a hummingbird, waiting to be inlaid with a mosaic of tiny agate-pieces as feathers.

It was beautiful.

“Need, that’s morbid,” Dara said. “Feels like robbing the dead.”

_:Why? I’m sure Urtho would be pleased, if he knew someone ever came back and finished it: _

“I don’t know the least thing about jewelry-making!”

_:You’re in luck, because I do: _Need was distracted, though; Dara could feel her drifting with longing toward the ironworking station, which had its own miniature forge. Cold and unlit, of course.

“What’s that?” Dara said, pointing at a bucket of parts, on a table where at least some of the items looked magical.

_:Who knows? Let’s go have a look: _

Foremost in the bucket were two hand-sized boxes, with paired mirrors as the lids. _:Hmm: _Need sent._ :This looks like the link-up for a paired scrying spell, but it’s not: _A pause. _:Let’s take it up with us: _

“Are you sure?”

_:We’ll put it with the other artifacts. Still need to figure out what most of them do: _Need’s mindvoice was speculative. _:If this is what I think it might be, it could be very useful to your Heralds:_

* * *

_:It’s active: _Need sent. _:Let’s see if this old thing really works: _

Dara eagerly took one of the boxes. “I’ll go upstairs.”

After examining the paired mirrors, Need had guessed that they might be a refinement of a design she had heard of in her time, if never seen, something called a ‘teleson’. The function was like a paired scrying-spell, which would allow two mages to view and speak to one another easily, except that this version wasn’t for mages; it used Mind-Gifts.

Anyone with Mindspeech, and maybe even Empathy, could use it once it was active – in fact, it ought to only take _one _such person, on one end, and the other user could be non-Gifted.

Need said they would work over any distance, with relatively little increase to power-expenditure compared to ordinary Mindspeech, and certainly compared to Vanyel’s – Leareth’s – communication spell. Dara wasn’t clear how that worked, but if it was true, it would be very handy.

Like the scrying-talismans back home, it was built into a permanent crystal focus; Need said it took only a thread of mage-power to activate, once, and once active, no mage was needed.

Dara could see why that might be very useful to Heralds in Valdemar. The downside was that it wasn’t secure against eavesdropping – it wasn’t very directional, and the amplification meant it could be ‘heard’ a long way from the source – but neither was Vanyel’s communication-spell; the solution was not to pass anything sensitive that way. It had still come in very handy.

She swung her way up onto the second level, and just for good measure, went through the small door and climbed all the way until the stairs ended. Sitting, she rested the box on her knees, looking into its mirrored surface.

_:Karna?: _she sent.

_:DARA?: _

–She clamped her hands over her ears, even though she knew it wouldn’t help. _:You don’t need to shout, please!: _

_:Is this better?:_

_:Much: _

It took her a moment to realize what was different, because it wasn’t ordinary Mindspeech. Oh. There were no overtones, no leakage – it was just like hearing another person speak, but in her head.

She looked down, and gasped. Need had been right about the ‘refinement’ of the design, it seemed; Karna’s face appeared in the mirror, distorted, but swimming into focus.

_:This is incredible!: _Dara sent. Her knees were almost vibrating with glee. _:All right, Karna, let An’dora try: _

It was too bad that this wouldn’t be more useful for their current situation. Randi – and Savil, and Shavri – would surely love to be able to talk to Vanyel as though face to face, but the fact that Vanyel was in Urtho’s Tower definitely counted as ‘sensitive’. They couldn’t take the risk of Leareth finding out about this – well, any further risk, after what they had already taken. Their entrance hadn’t exactly been as silent as they’d hoped at first, not after Rolan sent half of the Vuy she'edras scouts riding out to bring in supplies and find a Healer willing to stand by and wait for weeks and brave enough to enter Urtho’s Tower with no way out except magic.

It did offer a way for them to send reliable messages in and out of the Tower without leaving one of their Companions on the surface. Need thought she could tinker with the amplification, make sure it was only just sufficient to cross that distance of rock; at lower power, there was almost no chance a conversation could be detected off the Plains.

Dara had wondered if Savil, or Vanyel once he was well, might be able to do some more playing around and add something like directional shields. Private Mindspeech links, rather than open Mindspeech, were nearly impossible to detect at all, much less listen in on without the speakers noticing. Maybe this device could be made to work the same – in which case, it would have a _lot _of military applications.

Or maybe not. Urtho must have tried and failed. Maybe it was just a hard problem, for some reason.

A few minutes later, they were all sitting on various chairs and cushions. With the workshop left open – it had proved impossible to close the old trapdoor again – the floating platform had been moored off to one side, and with their bedrolls on another side, the floor was starting to feel rather crowded.

“We need to talk about plans,” Dara said.

It felt very odd, being the one who was apparently in charge. Karna wasn’t deferring to her, exactly, but she wasn’t the one giving orders either.

She rested a hand on Rolan’s mane, silently leaning into the comfort of their bond. “One. Vanyel, you’re improving steadily, but you’re _not _well, and it looks like it’s going to take a while.” He was a lot more clearheaded, almost back to his normal self in conversation, but he could barely walk the length of the room.

Again to her surprise, he only nodded. “You’re right.” A crooked smile. “Seems I don’t bounce back the same way at thirty-three that I did at eighteen. Inconvenient, but it is what it is.”

“Right.” Dara glanced around the room. “Two. I’m starting to suspect that we’ve barely touched the surface of this place. Need and I still have the backlog of artifacts to examine, and we found two more hidden rooms today that we haven’t gotten into yet.” It seemed Urtho had been very fond of secret passages. Most of the clever mechanisms didn’t work right anymore, but they could be forced open. “I think it’s worth going over everything, if we find one or two more things as useful as the teleson. I mean, we’ve already found the map of where all Urtho’s permanent Gates were, and Rolan thinks some of them might still exist.” That would be a miracle of miracles, for Valdemar. Savil had been trying to crack permanent Gates for longer than Dara had been Chosen. If she could examine an actual threshold, that would surely be enough. “And the notes on the missing weapon, of course,” she added.

Unsurprisingly, the notes were as cryptic, incomplete, and difficult to translate as the plaques in the remaining rooms, but they thought it probably did refer to the weapon Urtho had actually used against Ma’ar, that had, in combination with the destruction of his Tower and something to do with a permanent Gate, set off the Cataclysm. If they could understand _that_, they could start to figure out a theory for the echoes of destruction that Leareth had spoken of, and confirm if he had been telling the truth. 

Nods all around.

“Three.” She swallowed hard. “Winter is coming in not too long. It’s already frosting, and the first major snows will probably arrive in a few weeks. At which point it’s going to become a very bad idea to travel around the Plains, especially when Vanyel is still recovering. So…we need to make a decision, in the next few weeks. Either we risk Gating out, now, or we stay the winter.”

Blank silence.

Dara turned to meet the Healer’s eyes. “An’dora, you can decide separately from the rest of us; you don’t actually have to stay down here. You’ve already said that at this point Vanyel needs good food and rest more than he needs actual Healing, and we would still have Need. We appreciate everything you’ve done, but it’s already been weeks, and your clan must be missing you.”

The Healer tilted her head in acknowledgement. “That is right. If it is well with both of you, I might stay another week, and I will be able to seek Pretera’sedrin before the first deep snows.”

“Thank you.” Dara turned back to the others. “Karna, Vanyel, you both have a say in this. How do you feel about staying until spring?”

Karna’s answer was immediate. “I do not mind. It will offer time to finish all of the translations.” Her eyelids flickered. “I would prefer to leave the original copies where they were found. It seems more respectful.”

Dara didn’t really understand that, but Urtho wasn’t the ancient hero and saviour of _her _people, so she said nothing. “Van?”

He shifted his weight on the cushion. “I mean, I want to go home. I would rather not be here another, what, three or four months – but I want to go through a Gate even less.” A shrug. “So I prefer to stay, I guess.”

It seemed the decision was made. Dara felt like it should have been harder than that.

“Good!” she said brightly. “It’s going to be harder for us to get in and out for supplies, once the snow is really deep, so I think what we should do is buy a lot. I mean a LOT. Enough that we would be fine all winter and then some, just in case.” She really, really, really didn’t want to run out of food again. _I want it piled up to the ceiling. _“And we should leave half of the teleson on the surface,” she added. “Once Need fixes it so we won’t be projecting halfway across the world. And we’ll need some kind of protocol to avoid giving away sensitive information. Code-names and code-words, maybe.” Dara found the idea appealing; it made her feel like a spy on a spy-mission.

_:Probably overkill on both fronts, love, but I appreciate the sentiment: _Rolan’s mindvoice was fond. _:There is another point we must discuss: _

Right. “Last item. If we’re staying, we really probably ought to get some kind of message back to Valdemar, to tell them what’s keeping us. We thought this journey would take three or four months, but it’s going to end up being almost a year.” She took a deep breath. “I think our best option is to send Rolan, without me. He can ride faster that way.” Not just because of the lesser weight; as Groveborn Companion, Rolan was even tougher than normal Companions, and could go longer periods without sleep or rest than Dara could. Pushing the pace, he could make it all the way back to Haven in a week.

_And I’ll grit my teeth and do my best. _It wouldn’t be for that long. Two weeks. She would know he was coming back. She had been mostly-separated from him for longer than that while Vanyel was comatose. _I can do this. _

Vanyel gave her a very sympathetic look, but he didn’t offer to send Yfandes instead. Good. She would have boxed his ears if he had.

“So that’s decided, then.” She stood up. “Supper? I cooked last night, so it’s someone else’s turn.”


	23. Chapter Twenty-Three

The door to the Work Room creaked open.

“Dara,” Karna said faintly. “Vanyel. You should see this.”

Vanyel pulled himself into a sitting position. “Come show us?” He was feeling stronger today, but not enough that he wanted to get up and cross the room on a whim.

Dara, who had been lying on her back on the floating platform and twirling Need around, quickly slid down and padded over. She had seemed a little glum ever since Rolan left, but she was bearing up to it well enough, Vanyel thought.

The Scrollsworn stumbled over to his corner, and sank to her knees. “I will read you what I have translated so far. This is dated to the year of the Cataclysm itself, most likely shortly before the war began.”

She closed her eyes.

_I have spoken to King Leodhan, and his decision is made. We will not wait for Ma’ar’s armies to move in on us. The day he is crowned King, as we suspect that he will be, we attack. _

_I cannot blame Leodhan for this choice. The advantage is always to the first mover, and we cannot afford to wait. The risk is too high. Ma’ar’s empire is growing too quickly, and I shudder to think what he will do with more power. _

_It is my advice that led Leodhan to this conclusion. I have spoken to him of my once-student’s ambition, of the callousness I saw in him, the cold disregard for all that is sacred – and also of his warmth, and how once he risked punishment, fighting to defend another child. _

_I tell Leodhan that perhaps Ma’ar cares too much, and it blinds him. He tries to impose his vision of how things ought to be, and does not consider the cost inherent in power and control, in overriding the wishes of his fellow man. I feared for his path twenty-five years ago, and I was unable to guide him to the light, and so now there is no choice but to stop him. _

_And yet, I wonder if it something I will come to regret. I am not sure. _

_In his heart, does Ma’ar still call me friend? If I betray him, it will surely be too late for that._

Karna lowered the paper, her hands trembling. “That is all.”

Vanyel lifted a hand to his forehead, massaging away the sudden tension.

Ma’ar hadn’t been the aggressor after all. At the very least, it had started as a war of self-defence. Maybe he had waged it brutally until the end, but nonetheless. _That’s exactly what we did when the Karsites attacked us. _

It changed things.

He made himself look Karna in the eye. Her cheeks were drawn tight, every part of her locked down.

“You didn’t know,” he said softly. “That Urtho started the war.”

Karna said nothing, only shook her head slowly.

It had to be a lot for her to absorb. More than for him, maybe – he knew Leareth, and it was actually quite easy to believe that Ma’ar, his younger self, had never wanted a war with Urtho at all. _And Urtho isn’t a beloved hero of my people. _

It was a bit surprising that Urtho, who hadn’t been ruthless enough to destroy the Royal City when that might have turned the tide, had been willing to strike at Ma’ar first. Or maybe not. _He was afraid. _And it clearly wasn’t a decision he had made without inner conflict, but he had believed he was doing the right thing, or at least the safe thing.

Though it hadn’t ended up that way at all.

The Shin’a’in hardly believed that Urtho had been perfect, or always wise, but Vanyel had the sense they deeply believed in his fundamental goodness – and that his having thrown the first blows in the war that had destroyed their homeland would shake that foundation.

Would they spread it around?

That would up to Karna, he thought, and the other Scrollsworn. He thought he knew what Karna would push for. She was a historian – she cared deeply about the truth. It was one of the things he respected the most about her.

Worry about it later. It wasn’t his problem anyway. Start with what this implied for Valdemar.

…Unclear. It painted Ma’ar in a slightly better light than Ravenwing’s version, but Vanyel could predict that Randi would have more a lot sympathy for Urtho’s role in this particular story.

Urtho, who had started a war because he feared for his people and their future, and had ended up nearly destroying everything. All of his actions had been understandable, defensible, and in the end it hadn’t mattered at all.

_I think he was wrong. _Words that Vanyel wasn’t quite ready to say out loud, yet, with Karna listening.

And the corollary to that thought, that came with rising, sick horror: _what if we’re about to make the same mistake? _

Young Ma’ar had been a lot less terrifying than Leareth was now – gods, it was a weird thought, that Ma’ar hadn’t been much older than Vanyel was now at the time of the final confrontation. Not even forty.

He had already set up his immortality. Not for certain; he could have survived the Cataclysm, and done it later; but it seemed likely that his body at least had died. Either in the counterattack that Urtho had mentioned to Ravenwing before his death – one final effort to defeat the enemy, the Star-Eyed had said – or just in the general destruction.

Had Urtho known? Surely not, or he would have mentioned it at least once. Unless it was the sort of suspicion that he hadn’t wanted to commit to even the most private of paper.

_I wonder if Ma’ar learned what he needed here. _

Urtho’s Tower had been the scholarly capital of the entire world at the time. Hellfires, Valdemar still hadn’t caught up. The records that had survived were so much less than Vanyel could have wished for – it seemed that Urtho had succeeded at sending most of his notes and books with the evacuation, before he turned his Tower into a funeral pyre. Dara had found a dozen rooms full of empty shelves, that must have been archives, with still-legible plaques detailing an incredible categorization system.

_I wonder where they are now. _Maybe Ravenwing’s group had taken some, and they would most likely have been passed off to the Tayledras at the time of the Sundering, and become part of their current lore. Maybe they even had a secret archive somewhere. But the Tayledras hadn’t kept the secrets of permanent Gates.

There had been a number of other groups, but they still knew very little of the logistics for the evacuation, except that it had involved Urtho’s network of permanent Gate-termini. The map Karna had found wasn’t actually very useful for pinpointing their locations, since the surrounding kingdoms were completely different, and so were the major landmarks. What had once been rivers, forests, and even mountain ranges were utterly gone. The Dhorisha Plains hadn’t been there at all, obviously, and if they were right about the scale, Lake Evendim was missing as well. At a guess, it was around where the Kingdom of Predain had been – Ma’ar’s natal land, the original kernel of his empire. His first empire, rather.

Which made it very suspicious, that it had now been replaced by a vast body of water. A crater? The Dhorisha Plains were sunken as well, and might have filled with water if the climate had been less arid.

Two epicenters. One where Urtho had called down Final Strike, augmented by the unknown safeguards on his Tower – a few hundred copies of the artifact Vanyel and Dara had encountered would have done the trick. That made sense, but the other…

The other could possibly have been Ma’ar’s Citadel, from which he had led his side of the war.And where, maybe, a counterattack they still knew next to nothing about had found him.

That was one record they had no chance of finding – during the final candlemarks, Urtho almost certainly hadn’t had time to write in his journal about it. Only to retrieve an unknown artifact, one of sixteen weapons so awful he had kept their very existence secret, and have it brought to the surface. Vanyel could almost picture him, or maybe some of his students or hertasi, dragging the floating barge into that empty room, lifting something, moving it up through the hatch. He imagined Urtho giving it to…who? Some brave young champion, or a team of such, the best of the best among the survivors of his army. Maybe a crew of flying gryphons. Explaining to them what the weapon did – or maybe not, maybe there hadn’t been time and he had only told them how to point it at the enemy.

A treacherous journey through enemy territory, perhaps by air. A final, desperate push.

A story they might never know. Urtho hadn’t lived to see the ending, and it seemed very unlikely that said plucky band of heroes had survived to tell their tale. Even Ma’ar must not have seen it coming, or he would have found a way to escape. If anyone remembered, it was the gods, and Vanyel doubted they were going to share.

He was still missing a piece.

_Three things destroyed the homeland, _the Goddess had said to Ravenwing. _The self-destruction of the Gate that you fled through – the Final Strike of your master and overlord, and the firing of the safeguards on his Tower, intended to destroy his stronghold before it might fall into enemy hands – and a great weapon of your master’s design, one final effort to defeat your enemy. _

They had strong physical evidence of the Final Strike, and circumstantial findings for the weapon. _I wish he’d left the damned plaque behind. _The Gate… From the discussion after the capital city was taken, it sounded like permanent Gate-thresholds could be shut down in a way that released enough energy to destroy a city, but ‘destroying a city’ wasn’t much compared to the rest.

Vanyel was confused. Maybe he was still too foggy to be thinking about this.

_:’Fandes?: _he sent hopefully. _:What do you think?: _He still felt a wash of gratitude every time he was able to use Mindspeech without pain.

She had been listening in on his surface thoughts, and he didn’t need to back up and fill her in. _:Hmm. You’re right that I think we can only make guesses about the details of the attack, but hopefully we can narrow in on what the weapon was, exactly. Which could give us some leads on figuring out if Leareth is telling the truth about the supposed danger in a few centuries: _

That was a fair point. He had quite a lot of information on the initial effects, thanks to Ravenwing’s memories – the warped landscape, the Changed creatures and plants – but Ravenwing’s group hadn’t included many scholars, and their priority had been survival, not developing a theory to explain the damage. Maybe Starwind and Moondance would have some ideas. The Tayledras had been combating that damage for millennia; they must have studied it in depth.

_:I’m still not sure what this tells us about Ma’ar’s character: _Yfandes went on. _:And the implications now. He did a lot of bad things. But, well, the world is complicated sometimes. Urtho did a few things that make me uneasy as well: _

_:You’re talking about his control over the gryphons’ reproduction?: _Vanyel guessed.

_:Yes. I mean, they were thinking, intelligent beings. Just like you or I. And he loved them, clearly, but he still bred them like animals: _

Urtho’s gryphons had been often on his mind, if his journals were any representation. A created race, known as one of the most impressive Great Workings of his time – Urtho had designed and led it, but it had taken hundreds of mages working together. Most of the actual details of the process were lost, they had only Urtho’s random musings, but it had to have been an incredible feat of coordinated concert-magic. Vanyel could scarcely imagine it.

And Urtho had inexplicably designed his new species so that they were unable to breed without the use of a particular spell. One that only he knew. He had been in complete control, still been tinkering with the various bloodlines when the war arrived.

_:I wonder if any of them survived?: _It sounded like they had been included in the evacuation, but it would be incredibly sad if they had all died out a generation later, unable to bear children without their creator’s help.

_:I’m sure Urtho taught someone else the spell before he sent them out: _Yfandes sent, soothingly. _:He wouldn’t have forgotten that. They must be out there somewhere: _A thoughtful pause. _:I wonder where: _

Dara and Karna had started speaking to each other, but Vanyel barely paid attention, the words drifting past – he was deep in his own thoughts. _:He created the hertasi: _he sent. _:Or finished them, rather: _According to a couple of offhand lines from Urtho’s notes, the lizard-like people had been ‘bred’, using magic, from a local species of swamp-lizards – but only to around the level of bondbirds, or the best Shin’a’in horses. Urtho was the one who had brought them to fully human-level intelligence. _:It’s such a bizarre thought: _

Ma’ar had done his own Great Working, a hasty attempt to catch up and hold his own against Urtho’s gryphon forces, but it sounded like his _makaar _had been much less clever – trainable, and able to work together in battle, but Urtho had said dismissively that they ‘lacked a true will’. Vanyel, on reflection, wondered if that was deliberate. They had been created to fight a war, after all. Sending animals out to die was its own kind of awful – Jisa would be appalled – but maybe Ma’ar had seen it as kinder than the alternative.

One thing was sure: everything they had learned here only opened more questions.

* * *

Randi groaned, leaning back in his chair. “You’ve got to be kidding me.”

“I’m not.” Tran sat as well, lifting his feet one at a time to prop them on one of the other chairs. “Rolan got in a quarter-candlemark ago. Gave Delian and your Sondra the full run-down and he’s already headed back out. He’s not even staying overnight to rest.”

Little over a month left to Midwinter, and the first snow had already fallen in Haven. Jisa would be out throwing snowballs with her friends. Maybe Stef was one of them. _I hope that boy makes time for snowball fights. _

And Vanyel was alone with Dara in the buried ruins of an ancient mage-fortress, that they hadn’t even known existed, too ill to move until spring. At least it was an explanation for his delay, but the Senior Circle wasn’t going to be happy. Come to think of it, neither was the Council. Vanyel was officially on a ‘trade mission’, but no trade mission would last over-winter, and so he would need a different excuse.

A stumble in his thoughts. _I’m lying to my own Council. _It felt wrong. A dangerous path.

Maybe, but he didn’t have a damned choice about it.

…There was always a choice.

Fine. He was making a deliberate, considered decision not to tell the Council about Leareth yet, because it would be messy and complicated especially if Vanyel wasn’t even there for it, and because it might be a much easier announcement to make once they had the information to decide on a course of action. Those were good enough reasons, he thought, but he did need to remember the cost.

They already had some of those answers. Rolan had given Delian the quick version while he rested, Delian had passed it on to his Chosen, and Tran had recounted it to Randi. Urtho’s history with Ma’ar was quite a colourful tale, hard to swallow as something that had really happened, but Rolan seemed to think it was accurate enough.

Still, Vanyel might have his own lens on it, and Randi did want to hear his interpretation first, before he went public with any of it. _I respect his thinking, even now._

Possibly more so, given what he had learned. He trusted Vanyel’s judgement less – he wouldn’t want to base major decisions on it without a second opinion – but it was just a fact that Vanyel understood their enemy’s mind better than anyone. And that whatever else Leareth was, he was terrifyingly brilliant and had centuries of experience. Some of which he had passed along to Vanyel, apparently of his own free will.

Some of it had done Valdemar an awful lot of good.

It was easier to notice with Vanyel gone. Even in the three months before his departure, Randi had missed his presence and insights in their meetings – and he had still been able to meet with Vanyel privately whenever he wanted. Not having him at all, he had noticed himself wanting to glance over his shoulder and ask for Van’s thoughts a thousand times.

He was tempted to delay explaining it fully even to the rest of the Senior Circle. It wasn’t immediately decision-relevant, he didn’t think, and he knew very well how quickly errors could be introduced, when information was hastily passed along a chain of people. This one was actually rather long, Vanyel to Dara to Rolan to Delian to Tran to Randi. Rolan wouldn’t have deliberately misrepresented anything, of course, but communication was just hard.

And yet. Secrecy bore a cost; he knew it too well. There was a strong argument to tell them the preliminary findings immediately, not wait four months.

At some point he was going to have to tell Treven everything. Before he was crowned – he wasn’t going to put the lad in the position Elspeth had put him in – but hopefully that wouldn’t be anytime soon. Treven was a good lad, but he _was _still a kid. Their last few dinner parties had gone well enough, and he was making a good impression, but he did tend to drift into talking to Jisa. Understandably; she was a lot closer to his age than the various senior Heralds. 

“Copper for your thoughts?” Tran said.

Randi blinked. “Oh. I’m so sorry, I was woolgathering.”

He sighed. Tran was a good person to talk it over with – so why was he hesitating?

“Just thinking,” he said lightly. “I’d like to hear your sense of what this means, and what we should tell the rest of the Circle.”

* * *

F

or a long moment, Dara just stood and stared.

She had been doing a lot of exploring, keeping herself busy while Rolan was away. It had been weeks, he ought to be on his way back by now, but they didn’t _know _and waiting with nothing to do was agony.

The room she had just found, on the outskirts of the area they had mapped so far, had been very difficult to get into. First, she had needed to dig through a half-collapsed hallway; that alone had taken weeks. Even once she had cleared a path to the warren of little rooms, this one was accessible only through two layers of hidden doors, the outer of which had been magical rather than mechanical – Need had de-activated the ancient guard-spell, but it had taken Dara another two days to find the second door. She had realized it must be there at all after pacing out the length and width of the other adjoining rooms, and noticing a mismatch in measurements that indicated a hollow space.

The room was long and narrow, and almost entirely bare. At one end, set almost flush with the wall, there was an archway. It was a little taller and broader than an ordinary door and made of some translucent crystal, scintillating in the light from her lantern, carved with strange sigils. The base was a slab of almost perfectly white marble.

_:Need: _she sent finally. _:Is that what I think it is?: _If she was right, this would have been extremely useful to find two months ago.

A pause. _:I’m fairly sure of what it used to be: _Need sent dryly. _:Your suspicion is right. It was a permanent Gate: _

_:Was?: _

Dara felt the tug inside her head, and let Need guide her forward, moving her eyes downward. A mage-light blossomed above her head, giving better lighting.

There was a crack across the marble base.

_:It’s damaged: _Need sent. _:We’re actually outside the core shielded area – Urtho put the heaviest shielding around his weapons, which makes sense, and it’s the only reason they didn’t all go off with the Cataclysm: _A pause, and Dara felt the odd shift and tug behind her eyes that meant Need was looking around, mulling on a problem_. :At one point there were outer shields: _the sword added. _:I can still pick up traces, but the energy-pulse shattered them: _

Dara let her hand drift toward the marble, then stopped. _:Is it safe to touch?:_

This time, it was definitely a snicker. _:It’s safe, girl. Entirely unpowered, right now: _

_:Was it powered before?: _Dara’s fingertips brushed the marble. It was incredibly smooth, silky like water.

_:There would have been an energy source: _Need confirmed. _:Remember, permanent Gates can be opened by any apprentice. That means the mage isn’t providing most of the energy: _Her tone was slipping into what Dara thought of as her ‘teacher voice’ – slower, measured, with much less profanity than usual. _:Unfortunately, it looks like that was the least stable component, and it took the most blast-damage: _

Dara stood, running her fingers over the symbols etched in place.

_:It’s interesting: _Need mused. _:The way the Tower came down… Well, the more we see of the damage, the more surprised I am that anything was left intact. The surface was entirely slagged, but almost none of the blast went downward. Not usually how a big explosion works. Hells, it almost makes you wonder if it was built with that intention: _

Dara’s hand froze. _:What do you mean?: _

A chuckle. _:I doubt Urtho expected to blow up his own fortress, but he did have the failsafes. Maybe he planned other things as well. If he designed the layout right, to direct the force of the blast upward, he could have practically guaranteed that the deepest levels would survive unscathed: _

And buried where no one could reach them, Dara thought, unless they were willing to dig through solid rock for a very long time. Or were a specific mage of unusual capabilities, with Foresight-hints of exactly where to look.

_:Can you fix it?: _she sent hopefully. _:The Gate, I mean: _

An irritated mental sigh. _:I may be an Adept, but I’m not a god. Gates weren’t my field of study: _

And Need didn’t learn new things so well anymore. Dara had wondered vaguely how Need’s mind even worked – she could remember events and facts, that was clear, even without a body or brain, but nothing after her first life was all that clear or exact.

Dara wished she could ask Vanyel to look at the Gate, but the trip to reach it might be a little more than he was up to, as of yet – there was another of the trapdoor tube-ways involved, not to mention climbing over a giant pile of rubble.

_:I’ll have a try: _Need sent, her tone simultaneously irritated and conciliatory. _:And I can ask Van for thoughts. Maybe we can figure it out:_

* * *

Dara cracked open the door to the Work Room. “Van, are you…?” She had been looking for him for several minutes, to tell him that supper was ready.

It was almost Midwinter now. Nearly four months they had been in the Tower. Rolan had just gotten back, apologizing that the snows had started in Valdemar and delayed him. Dara forgave him.

“In here.” Vanyel’s voice was tight, almost choked.

She pushed the door farther – and saw him sitting with his back to her, cross-legged on a folded blanket, Yfandes next to him with her long jaw resting across his lap. His hands were raised, trembling, and – yes. A tiny, faltering, uneven ball of white light.

“Van!” she yelped. “That’s a mage-light!”

It winked out.

“Sorry, did I distract you?”

Vanyel twisted to smile at her, mopping at his slick forehead with one sleeve. His cheeks were flushed, eyes bright under a silvery fringe.

“I was about done anyway,” he said ruefully. “Oof. My channels are healed up enough, but, wow. I’m rusty.” He grimaced. “Or my mind is actually damaged from the spillover. I’ll have to wait until Melody or Jisa can have a look, to know for sure. Either way, it’s not pretty.” 

“You can use it at all, though,” Dara offered brightly. “That’s a good sign.”

“Sort of.” Vanyel leaned back, half-flopping against Yfandes’ flank. “Shields and mage-lights are easy. I couldn’t do anything fiddly or complicated right now, like a trap-spell, certainly not an illusion. Or a Gate. I wouldn’t feel comfortable going near nodes.” He held up his hands, wriggling the fingers. “Imagine you were trying to do things with your hands, but you didn’t have any feeling in your fingers, and your thumbs were broken. You could do some things, crudely, but you couldn’t tie a knot, let alone weave a tapestry, _and _you wouldn’t be able to lift heavy things.”

“Is that what it feels like?” It sounded awful.

“Metaphorically. Also, _ow_.” Both hands went to his temples.

“All right, I think you should be done now.” Dara held out her hand. “Come with me, let’s get you back to bed.”

Vanyel took it, and let her haul him to his feet. “Gods, this is embarrassing.”

“What do you mean? It’s not your fault.” With a hand under his elbow, she helped him towards the Work Room door. “Besides, we’ve got two or three months here. Practice every day, and you’ll be good as new by the time we get home. No one will ever have to know.”

* * *

Vanyel lay with the blanket pulled over his head, curled up in the darkness. Dara had called lights-out half a candlemark ago; before leaving, An’dora had finally convinced her that full darkness would let them sleep better than leaving the lights on at their sunset level; but he was having trouble falling asleep, and he had gotten out the scrap of paper again. Urtho’s final entry, the very last thing he had written that had survived the Cataclysm. It wasn’t even dated, so they didn’t know how long it had been before the final battle, but the situation had been dire.

It was just past Midwinter. They had all of Urtho’s journal entries translated, along with a stack of untranslated letters that they believed were in Ma’ar’s hand, an ancient magical device that allowed them to easily communicate with Vel’asha on the surface despite her lack of Mind-Gifts, a pile of artifacts with yet undiscovered purposes, and the remains of what had once been a permanent Gate. 

Progress. Vanyel wasn’t sure whether it was really worth the delay, but it wasn’t like they had much of a choice. Outside, the Plains were deeply carpeted in several yards of snow, and the blizzards would last until spring.

_Center and ground. _Vanyel reached for his power, and formed a tiny mage-light in his palm. It shone warm yellow, clear and even. He could feel it tugging in his mind, like scars stretching, but it didn’t quite hurt.

He had been practicing every day, possibly harder than he should have been – a few times he had ended up out for a day afterwards with backlash. It was almost Midwinter, and maybe he couldn’t Gate, hold any shielding more complex than a barrier, or manage an illusion with any more detail than fog – but he could damned well read to himself after Dara went to bed without her finding out.

He focused his eyes on the page.

_I wish there were magics that might let one take back the past, and do it over. _

_There is no such spell; this is my bed, I have made it and I must lie in it. _

_I think now it was a mistake to let Leodhan push for war. Perhaps it would have ended so all the same, and with Tantara in a weaker position as the unprepared defender – and yet, I sometimes think that if it had, it might have been over more quickly, mercifully, and with less bloodshed on either side. _

_What is wrong with me? War has left me so weary, I catch myself wishing that my worst enemy might have won sooner. _

_I never wished to call Ma’ar my enemy. _

_Perhaps I made a wrong turn sooner, and in some other world I might have salvaged my young student, and guided him to a kinder and less destructive path. Perhaps in some other world, we work together now, as allies and friends. I long to step out of this world and into that, and of course I cannot. _

_I am a sentimental old man, it seems, and unsuited to commanding an army. _

_This is not how I wished it to end, and I am sure Ma’ar did not wish for it either. Even now, he sends letters, and tries to broker an alliance that I can no longer offer him. He has strayed too far. The atrocities of this war are unforgivable. _

_No matter what comes, he must not take the Tower, and the powers that lie within my sanctum. I am glad beyond measure that I never spoke of this to him, though I revealed far more than I should have. I trusted him more than I should have. _

_And so it will end as it ends, as we tear apart each other’s armies in fiery destruction, and perhaps history will remember a foolish old man who misjudged his greatest enemy. _

_I wish it were otherwise. _

It wasn’t a very coherent note, and Vanyel had seen the original text; it wandered all over the page, the handwriting of an exhausted man scribbling out a note in his diary, that he surely hadn’t realized would be his last, before falling into his bed.

It still brought tears to his eyes.

Days or weeks after the Mage of Silence had written this final note, he had stood alone in his empty tower and let go of everything, turning the horizon to fire. All to deny his treasures and weapons to an enemy whom even he wasn’t sure was an enemy at all. He had been uncertain of it until the end.

And it hadn’t mattered in the least. Accidentally or deliberately, it was Urtho who had set off the Cataclysm. Not Ma’ar.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Aaaand that is the end of book 8! Readers of Mercedes Lackey canon will note that I've played fast and loose with the events of the Mage Wars prequels, as depicted here. I hope you've enjoyed Van's glimpse into Ma'ar's history. 
> 
> There may be a hiatus before the start of book 9 - I'm dealing with a major illness right now, and will be in surgery next week. However, not to worry - this story *is* complete, at least in rough draft, with 3 more volumes to go.


End file.
